Burning House Press

3 poems by Juliet Cook

Sawing Through

Lap dance underwater with

sharks.

Limbs tossed into
bleeding mosh pits.

Those still alive are uniform,

guns, glass, hate.
Won’t stop shooting,
biting, spitting out

splintered heads they don’t want
to swallow.

Lacerated tongues which

can no longer speak.

Stuffed animal lair only

allows meat eating breeds

filled with contracting, contractual,
expanding killer teeth.

Dialect of smashed windows

dragging you away.

Intrusive Obsession

Hiding in the background,
then quietly limping to the side

of my peripheral vision,
then suddenly racing towards my headspace.

Screaming internally then constricting

my throat with heaves and gasps and

compulsions, every membrane screaming

obsessive images about how men are looking

at creampie dripping down
younger women’s thighs
and I’m a boring middle
aged woman his age

with saggy breasts and a heart
instead of just an opening

aimed to explode in his face.

Like a Ouija board strobe light inside

my brain, this obsession won’t stop

until my head splatters.

Invisible Ink

Possible poem lines emerge in bed,

in the midst of what seems like a semi-dream/

semi-reality state, followed by internal glitch

in which a semi-truck aims to run over

my new lines or my entire head.

I thought I had managed

to temporarily sit up and

write down my impending words, but

the first pen was devoid of ink.

The second pen spit a thin drizzle

of almost invisible blood,

which soon disappeared.

When I awoke, nothing new

was on the page. Had my words ever been there

at all? I could no longer remember the words
which had felt like they were writing themselves

inside my semi-invisible brain.

Perhaps it was just an illusion.

The bedside table was loaded

with hundreds of sheets of paper,

repetitive to-do lists. But no poetry.

My new lines must have been
thrown away or swallowed or
trapped inside the dream or else

never fully existed.

I re-entered real life,

viewed the latest news,
saw death, murder, evil

worse than nightmares.
Part of me wished I was still stuck
in a dream. If I look away, am I acting
like another dead body is invisible ink?

Juliet Cook doesn’t fit inside an Easy-Bake Oven and rarely cooks. Her poetry has appeared in a peculiar multitude of literary publications. She is the author of numerous poetry chapbooks, most recently including “red flames burning out” (Grey Book Press, 2023), “Contorted Doom Conveyor” (Gutter Snob Books, 2023), “Your Mouth is Moving Backwards” (Ethel Zine & Micro Press, 2023), “REVOLTING” (Cul-de-sac of Blood, 2024), and “Blue Stingers Instead of Wings” (Pure Sleeze Press, 2025). Her most recent full-length poetry book, “Malformed Confetti” was published by Crisis Chronicles Press. You can find out more at https://julietcook.weebly.com/.

February 12, 2026

from wastes / wraiths by James Knight

in air thick with lack of light deep stink of hot mammal

and stabbing breath

looped like my passage through this space

what is it we fear when images come to mind

do we sense something that inhabits rooms and woodlands

beyond exhalation

under duress

my door ceases to be mine

I crumple into an apology the bedsheets are too clean for me

when the human beast arrives it hunkers down and won’t budge

remembering the man gone mad asleep

clubbing his family to death

James Knight is a poet, artist, performer and publisher based in the UK. Publications include Cosmic Horror (Hem Press), Rites & Passages (Salò Press), Machine (Trickhouse Press) and Void Voices (Hesterglock Press). Website: www.thebirdking.com. Bluesky: @badbadpoet. Instagram: @jkbirdking.

February 11, 2026

Music #4: To Wander by Robert Frede Kenter

What was our poison touch, of palm lines

centred on hands, opening chords

into the body, incisions rent inside

like wreathless layers of skin?

A glorious kinetic estrangement

feed-back loops speaking in tonality /

urban reconstruction: organ runs, skronky sax,

industrious clarity / at the edge. In the frame,

increments. And

some time later, New York City,

alone. Glorious / audacity.

I saw your shadow forty feet long crossing

father demo square to come up stairs

after the ritual throwing up of food

I tossed down the ring with the skeleton key.

Enactments between us always began with something

breath/ less. Taking starkest energy.

Was it you then,

dressed in a white tuxedo? Art student

of midnight, your ironed shirt, clover-patterned pants

sitting angular at the edge of a conceptual stare,

a concrete floor, iron bed-sit, installation.

Being, the notion of prayer,

or, in waiting at an abutment outside the Mudd Club

or somewhere else , in another outfit,

I remember your troweled performance on a couch

in the sprung rhythms of acid house.

Such memories / walk / me waking

forward

to specular lipstick on pale skin,

circular meridians drawn in cups

from a river.

To tie red hemp rope around your

waist, tautly hold down your thigh

to hook beneath the back of knees

for levitation, a shuddering radio static

meeting clustered mind, gathering up

in suspension’s glove for inertia. We ache

in de-evolution towards ancestors, the

awesome incisive markings, spine of

your bridge, arched, offering, gravity-less

spectral juxtapositions: wigs / wraps,

buttoned / in collated

collars; marginalia /collective sighing of electric

guitars in process /a novel /

pages with annotations, yes, without

you we are in for a long triage.

Hand over hand, climbing over

indelicate industrial clamor, unrolling

typewriter ribbons to erase propaganda broadsheets / smear

the news and various

other kinds of puppeteer topographies /

with spilled black ink blood.

Wandering / steps behind a

procession. At the parade grounds of immolation,

we sit on our knees, for hours / Try to

stand up straight with

a wishbone lodged in the prism of

your throat, already broken, outmaneuvered /

we were plates of glass, shattered

fragments, separated from everything.

Sometimes /planes take off from here,

on time. Even cauliflower

softens in the pan. You were once

serenaded by electricity volts, hand-held by numbers

of your fans who came to see you perform.

(new stanza)

Now / (note): I serenade your memory.

Dictate stenographic emblems

to exposed toes. I

want to shake in crescendo, howling

in a complicated realm of teeth.

Programmed noise for synthetic generative

chatter.

Titled, Music # 4: It is /

so cold outside. Never forgot

your urgency /

The predilection / to wander.

Robert Frede Kenter is a widely published writer, visual artist, performer, & publisher of
Ice Floe Press (www.icefloepress.net) with work in over 200 publications published or
forthcoming including: Watch Your Head, Harpy Hybrid, ballast, winged moon, ABR, storms
journal, heavy feathers, petrichor, Cable Street, Burning House, Pissoir, Lost & Found Times,
Blood & Honey, Otoliths, Paragraph, The Prose Poem Journal etc.. In Anthologies incl:
Capitalism is a Death Cult (Sunday Mornings at the River), Speaking in Tongues (Steel
Incisors), The Book of Penteract (Penteract Press). Interpoem 1 & 2 (Sedserio), Glisk and
Glimmer (Sidhe Press). Select books: Moon Writing (with Catherine Graham) (Ice Floe Press,
2026), In the Blueprint of Her Iris (with Vikki C) (Ice Floe Press, 2025), Father Tectonic (Ethel
Zine, 2025), Audacity of Form (Ice Floe Press, 2019). Robert was guest editor of Secrets and
Lies (July, 2019) at Burning House Press and has lots of other projects on the go.
Soc media X: @frede_kenter, IG: icefloe22, r.f.k.vispocityshuffle, Bluesky:
@rfredekenter.bsky.social‬.

February 10, 2026

3 poems by Laurence Lillvik

American Sonnet #61

did you leave me here to collapse

or was your intention to transform

me into an elk? it’s important to

know because we used to park

at the waterfront in Red Bank

and make out and there was

that one time when a cop car

pulled up right next to us and

it looked like I was all alone in

the back seat of my car and you

really seemed to … well, you

had a flair for the dramatic, and

i often behaved like a child, blood

sugar issues and all of that shit.

Wraith

I’ve been privy to your bold designs,

Cold-called by piss merchants in

The dead days of spring, and seen

Your type on the esplanade,

Gumming yourselves mute, with

Expectations of recognition.

And who am I, you may ask,

So granular in my critiques of

Pure season, when just last week

I was pulling my skivvies on

With a pair of grilling tongs?

Hey, even a cool breeze on flayed skin

Is better than a hot sleep with dreams of you.

Even a dozen spins

Around the town’s worst rotary,

Exit signs obscured by the

Shimmying smog you call a

Marine layer, won’t leave me as dizzy

As one playback of your voicemails.

Selected Ambient Works

An outstretched and oversized-

Darlin’ you can ~~kill~~ kidnap me-

Kind of hand. Ringless

In the dull light, ~~sunbleached~~

An afterthought. The roving

Cloudburst with ark-making

Deluge revisits your pathway.

It’s unusual for the snakes

To roost in the fickle strawbeds

Of your youth. Time-released

madness ~~always~~ often tricks

The lizard brain into a ceasefire.

Oh ~~honey~~ honeyed ointment,

Leave us sticky and commendable

Laurence Lillvik (Portland, OR) is the editor of “Skullcrushing Hummingbird,” an international arts and literature zine. A new full-length collection of poems, “Catharsis Is Never Fully Shorn From Glee,” is forthcoming from Trident Press in the spring of 2026. His chapbook “Criterion” (Greying Ghost Press) was a featured small press title at Powell’s Books. His poetry has also appeared in several literary journals and DIY poetry chapbooks. Musically, Laurence is the founder of KalloHumina, an umbrella project for solo work and live improvised collaborations. He’s worked in Public Libraries for over two decades. IG: larstarts / skullhum.com

February 9, 2026

SUMMER NEEDS by Sara Matson

<1>

my suede hand

warm + gloved

pinning swollen fist on

either side of ur mandible

+ screaming until the jaw

snaps (so visceral !)

my wet thigh sticky

(unexpected blood)

i tuck my body beneath

stubbed nose cold comfort

watching my verbal tics echo

in the rugless lobby

my god,

that’s what summer needs

a cropped linen jacket

just shaped enough

to warm my tits in

cool summer shade

no pride or shame in making

an old woman cry

… i’m the old woman

<2>

the ridiculousness of lunch glass

or getting chewed out

in the afternoon thicket

… unthinkable !

vibrant creature,

effervescence of youth

forest green + humbled by

succulence or prosperity,

buccal fat smeared in shiny layers

refracting age or wisdom

<3>

then me

+ the vibes i give:

nervous forgiveness

stuffed with love which cannot carry

s w a m p

incurable lack/deepest ache

sun schemes (insofar as to stop the sun

and it’s bullshit)

but like, … friendly ?

yes,

my hairline continues

to fur itself by fireplace

many extra fingers invited to

light + curl

squeezing crunch into velvet

before botox is just called youth

let me lick yours like a ruffle,

like a scream in church !

in my mother’s voice:

CRY OUT A WINDOW ABOUT IT

TELL THE MIDNIGHT MAN

REMEMBER THE SLIME RIVER

ah,

of course

her indifference reminds me

to invoke the river of slime

to soak my sins in

the neon absolution

of undone mildew stains

like imposition over injury

<4>

the back of my neck

is so hairless

(from the accident)

that when i was nailing my wistfulness

to the new wallpaper

i adhered myself to the baseboard

gathering dust like spring grain

in my historically accurate suit

admiring medieval books

on weddings

+ informal sutures

Sara Matson (she/her) is a poet in Chicago and host of the seasonal online reading series Words // Friends. Her poems can be found in Discount Guillotine, Kicking Your Ass, The Chicago Reader and elsewhere. Her favorite color is lime green and you can find her on Instagram @skeletorsmom and Blue Sky @saramatson.bsky.social.

February 8, 2026

4 poems by Damon Hubbs

Olympia

Real love. Unsparing introspection

Oh, for heaven’s sake

fucking ____________________ .

Jennifer
You (& Jennifer)
Jack the Modernist
Veronica, Ted, Sabalenka, Sailor Socialism
the museum goers at The Frick,

a poem for trapped things, the solar anus

the girl whose lips

are like

the last helicopter

out of Saigon

O lose the noise

you’re going to be all right

go home, spoon the Hitachi

blackmatter

Berkshire Hathaway

Dear Cinnette,

did you obtain cheap land, seek fortune,

join a religious community—

I’m taking the kitchen sink approach

Where do the coordinates lead…

Delia Deetz died.

The Lily Jean sank off the coast of Gloucester.

The streets are draped in anti-drone nets.

Today, when I was looking at the clouds

I remembered how Leni Riefenstahl attached automatic cameras to balloons.

I want to fall in love

with a blind flower girl

who mistakes me

for a millionaire.

Even the Automobiles Here Seem to Be Ancient

Dear Cinnette, I grew tired of the world

at the Braintree split

but there’s no shepherdess in sight

the ice floes on the Merrimack look like wounded angels

Dear Cinnette, the sun’s fixed stare expresses something beyond death

I’m letting my beard grow

Let’s just say

your period

is the ultimate form of punctuation

Which one of your phone calls changed my life fuck

I’m raising a toast to Odin

and the beauty of Japanese volcanoes

Last I heard you hitched a ride to Salt Lake

O Madonna

of the Trail—

Dear Cinnette, Infinite Jest turned 30

Sabalenka was penalized for a midpoint grunt

I saw a woman at Stop & Stop

buying avocados

like it’s 2010

I heard Thom bit off a prostitute’s toe in Prague

I’m high on benzos godspark

Dear Cinnette Il faut être absolument modern

Did you know in 1955

Friehofer’s still used horse drawn carts

to deliver baked goods in Schenectady—

Imagine if your whole job was putting cherries on cupcakes

Imagine if our midpoint grunt went on forever.

Dobermann

If you said all I do is write love poems

I’d say I’m solving the crisis of panty lines

but that’s just another comedy

for our conspiracy

theory

age

Again the snow is scatterbrained

millions of individual

amens

and I’m thinking

about the time

we had sex at the Tate Modern

If you said it was like a love poem

featuring Rouveyre’s car and several Soviet bikers

I’d say

look at the charm of the industrial streets.

Fun is a steel bath in Mitteleuropa,

your tongue like a menacing dobermann.

~~MALMO~~

it feels very intimate, very private

being an author and a character simultaneously

like a crowd of people

at the beach

screaming shark! Shark!

Quite unlike the Oulipians

who organize their internet novels

by color

fake barn country

the IKEA back catalogue.

Dear Cinnette,

I prefer the dark arts

“So we shall take the train here to ~~MALMO~~,

then get into the car

and drive home to our house,

and all the way I shall revel in,

truly revel in”

how we used to smoke

in bed on Sundays

and read The Boston Globe,

Akhmatova, Letters to a Young Poet,

the cat purring like

a bloom of chocolate,

mirrors caressing the room

and the sense of things

careening

towards

a head

still a long

way

off

like a seizure

on a boat

in the middle of the sea

Damon Hubbs is a poet from New England. His latest collection, Bullet Pudding, is forthcoming from Roadside Press in 2026. Recent publications include Horror Sleaze Trash, Apocalypse Confidential, Be About It Press, Revolution John, The Literary Underground, RESSURECTION magazine, and others. His poems have been nominated for the Pushcart and Best of the Net. He is a poetry editor at Blood+Honey and The Argyle Literary Magazine. bluesky: @hubbsd.bsky.social

February 3, 2026

2 poems by Karina Longo

Symbiosis

The muffled sound of your
maple-infused voice stirred me;
it trapped me
in a vertiginous whirlwind of
fire and water.

What the hell is this—
this fighting that bends, never
breaks—starves, yet
illuminates.

You are the cement of
the sky; the sun casting
skin cancer and eternal glow,
the stars that count wishes
and blow to

dust.

How can one be the spit of
the smoker—
and the silver faucet that
cleans it?

Blinding fog that chokes
and shows the way;

I am a diver, not a seer.

Sylvia Plath Momentum

Blood-like fragments
in a silver sky—
I know it’s not true;
why, then, should I lie?

The water poisoned;
hellfire
in my brain—
thoughts like ashes,
yet your smiles remain.

If you can’t see it,
will it destroy you?
I’m still surrounded by
roses, illusions,
boredom.

And love
keeps stuttering
the words of a slut,
embracing what pours
up out of the mud.

Clay for the unwise,
moulding the impure.
I talk to God, yet like

she said;
the sky is empty—

I taste iron.

Karina Longo is a neurodiverse Brazilian-Italian poet based in Milan. Her poetry has been featured or is forthcoming in Expat Press, Be About It Press, Resurrection Mag, Some Words, Dodo Eraser, Michigan City Review of Books, Prosetrics, and elsewhere. Karina was nominated for the Pushcart Prize. Find her on X: @TheDarkestStar_

February 2, 2026

3 poems by Sean G. Meggeson

monument leaves

(upon reading Pasolini’s review of the Italian translation of Osip Mandelstam)

like the sun sets in motion a series

of actions let’s use the word ‘darkening’

let’s use the words ‘pre-emptive

state terror’ Lord let’s remember

mistake of merry Madelstam

too late gives back kisses lost love

of cunt tortured beyond desire

&attempts suicide after layering

perfect moustache joke memorized

perfect entropy eyes speculumed well

‘wounded’ is the wrong word now

‘monumented’ will have to do

so let’s go on knees attempt

to kiss a torso as tight

as Pasolini’s

countryside mannerisms

as object impermanent

as Lenin’s mother’s death

an old wet rope

a neck caressesd

a punchline

a snap as dull as a string of musty poem words

hope quick

hi hey

Boccaccio baby swim

pool bottom

end race boy oh boy

win ‘gain billiards

with Wilson buds from age

of buds wooden rackets from age

of wonks boozy-brilliant &binge stories

then &last night like morning

rumors like body &night arcs

&crossings like news

stations really ending no no

really ending wars

ending hallelujah

hey hey here come literally

sex w/ Bowie

whelmed by

two colors

&soft eyes of brother Terry

always with

a suicide body—

a sexy psyche—

salivating schizoid functioning

so Zurich friends

in those days wrote letters—

not instructing so much

as blowing a self

well dressed to heaven

wind

wild &caress

Sean G. Meggeson is a poet and video/audio/spoken word artist, living in Toronto, Canada where he works as a psychoanalytic psychotherapist with his dog, Tao. He has been published in a range of journals and magazines, including Antiphony, bethh, Die Leere Mitte , Ice Floe, Version9Magazine and others. He won the League of Canadian Poets Spoken Word Award in 2024. Meggeson has published three chapbooks, Cosmic Crasher (Buttonhook, 2024), ta o/j, and soma synthesis (both from lippykookpoetry, 2025). Forthcoming: a full-length poetry collection, j: poems (primitive press, Toronto, 2026) and an EP of spoken word & soundscape tracks, The Capacity to Be Alone. Sean is poetry co-editor of Blood+Honey Literary Magazine.

bluesky: @seangmeggeson.bsky.social

instagram: @sean_g_meggeson_poet

February 2, 2026

FEBRUARY 2026 Guest Editor Is Ingrid M. Calderón!!! Theme: LOVE & HATE

Burning House Press are excited to welcome Ingrid M. Calderón as the seventh BHP guest editor of our return series of special editions! As of today Ingrid will take over editorship of Burning House Press online for the month of February.

Submissions are open from today 1st February – and will remain open until 25th February.

Ingrid’s theme for the month is as follows

___

LOVE & HATE

___

Where does love end and hate begin? As an advocate of love in all its manifestations, I‘ve often found myself pondering and teetering on the soft umbilical cord of disillusionment when it comes to these emotions. I am not alone. Love & hate are siblings, —often share a room and define themselves by the company they keep. If needs remain unmet, what changes and how fast before combustion? If disappointment isn’t addressed, love and hate begin their resentful coexistence of two high volume breeds of circuitry.

All feelings at once please!

Ache. Want. Lust. Desire. Hate. Hostile. Loathe. Thirst. Hunger. Disgust. Violence.

I invite you to send poetries, hallucinations, uncomfortable journal entries and artworks pulled from the depths of where love & hate live inside you.

Ingrid is a poet, seer, collagist and the solitary editor of Resurrection magazine. She resides in Los Angeles, CA

___

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
- All submissions should be sent as .doc or .docx attachments to guesteditorbhp@gmail.com. No cover letter is necessary but please include a short third-person bio and (optional) photo of yourself for potential print with your submission. You may also consider including social media usernames, especially if you’re on Bluesky/Instagram– I want to promote your work!
- Please state the theme and form of your submission in the subject of the email. For example: LOVE&HATE/FICTION
- Submissions are open until 25th February and will reopen again on 1st March 2026 for a new theme/new editor/s.
- Poetry and Fiction
  For poetry submissions, submit no more than three of your best poems. Short stories should be limited to 1,500 words or (preferably) less. We encourage flash fiction submissions, no more than three at a time. Send these in as a .doc or .docx file, along with a short third-person bio, and (optional) photograph of yourself.
- Art
  Submit hi-res images of your works (drawings, paintings, illustrations, collages, photography, etc) with descriptions of the work (Title, Year, Medium, etc) in the body of the email. Files should be in .JPEG unless they are GIFs or videos, and should not exceed 2MB in size for each work. File names should correspond with the work titles. Video submissions can be uploaded onto Youtube or Vimeo for feature on our website. Send these submissions along with a short third-person bio, and (optional) photograph of yourself.
- Virtual Reality/ 3D Artworks
  For VR Submissions, please submit no more than three (3) individual artworks. For Tilt Brush works, please upload your artwork to Google Poly (https://poly.google.com/), and mark it as ‘public’ (‘remixable’ is at your own preference). A VR/3D artwork can also be submitted as a video export navigating through the artwork. If you prefer this method, please upload your finished video file to YouTube or Vimeo and provide a URL. With either format, please provide a 150 word artist’s statement.
- Non-fiction
  Non-fiction submissions (essays, reviews, commentary, interviews, etc) should be no more than 1, 500 words and sent as a .doc or .docx file along with your third-person bio/and optional photograph.

_______

BHP online is now in the capable hands of the amazing Ingrid M. Calderón – friends, arsonistas, send our February 2026 guest editor your magic!

February 1, 2026

JANUARY 2026 Guest Editor Is KAWAI SHEN!!! Theme: ULTRAVIOLET

Burning House Press are excited to welcome Kawai Shen as the sixth BHP guest editor of our return series of special editions! As of today Kawai will take over editorship of Burning House Press online for the month of January.

Submissions are open from today 3rd January – and will remain open until 25th January.

Kawai’s theme for the month is as follows

___

ULTRAVIOLET

Fresh bruises, wine stains, amethyst talismans, wilted lilacs, metallic fougeres, overripe mulberries, indigo children, laser burns, grape candy, supernova dust
Inspiration: Sei Shonagon, William S. Burroughs, Angela Carter, Mervyn Peake, Réjean Ducharme, Jean-Baptiste Del Amo, Aurora Mattia

Kawai Shen is based in Canada. Her fiction was shortlisted for the 6th edition of The Metatron Prize for Rising Authors and was selected for the Best Canadian Stories 2025 anthology. She has published work in khōréō, ergot, Extra Extra, The Whitney Review, A Fucking Magazine, and more. Her book, Wavering Futures, is forthcoming with Metatron Press in 2026.

______

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
- All submissions should be sent as .doc or .docx attachments to guesteditorbhp@gmail.com. No cover letter is necessary but please include a short third-person bio and (optional) photo of yourself for potential print with your submission. You may also consider including social media usernames, especially if you’re on Bluesky/Instagram– I want to promote your work!
- Please state the theme and form of your submission in the subject of the email. For example: ULTRAVIOLET/FICTION
- Submissions are open until 25th January and will reopen again on 1st February 2026 for a new theme/new editor/s.
  - Fiction: Fiction should be limited to 1,500 words or (preferably) less. Up to two micros (maximum 500 words) may be sent.
  - Poetry: You can try your luck with poetry, but this issue will focus on purple prose. Submit no more than three poems.
  - Art: Submit a maximum of six hi-res images of your work in JPEG format (maximum size 2MB) with descriptions of each work (Title, Year, Medium) in the body of the email. File names should correspond with the work titles.

_______

BHP online is now in the capable hands of the amazing Kawai Shen – friends, arsonistas, send our January 2026 guest editor your magic!

January 3, 2026

My Heart Is Empty: Responses to The Life and Work of Nico – December 2025 edition Guest Edited/Curated by Matthew Kinlin

Always Leave Them Wanting Less by Matthew Kinlin

Continue reading →

December 27, 2025

DECEMBER 2025 Guest Editor Is MATTHEW KINLIN!!! Theme: My Heart Is Empty: Responses to The Life and Work of Nico

Burning House Press are excited to welcome Matthew Kinlin as the fifth BHP guest editor of our return series of special editions! As of today Matt will take over editorship of Burning House Press online for the month of December.

Submissions are open from today 1st December – and will remain open until 21st DECEMBER.

Matt’s theme for the month is as follows

My Heart Is Empty: Responses to The Life and Work of Nico

Matthew Kinlin lives and writes in Glasgow. His published workst include Teenage Hallucination (Orbis Tertius Press, 2021); Curse Red, Curse Blue, Curse Green (Sweat Drenched Press, 2021); The Glass Abattoir (D.F.L. Lit, 2023); Songs of Xanthina (Broken Sleep Books, 2023); Psycho Viridian (Broken Sleep Books, 2024) and So Tender a Killer (Filthy Loot, 2025). Instagram: @obscene_mirror.

——

Submission Guidelines

All submissions should be sent as attachments to guesteditorbhp@gmail.com

Please state the theme and form of your submission in the subject of the email. For example: NICO/POETRY

Poetry and Fiction

For poetry submissions, submit no more than three of your best poems. Short stories should be limited to 1,500 words or (preferably) less. We encourage flash fiction submissions, no more than three at a time. Send these in as a .doc or .docx file, along with a short third-person bio, and (optional) photograph of yourself.

Art
Submit hi-res images of your works (drawings, paintings, illustrations, collages, photography, etc) with descriptions of the work (Title, Year, Medium, etc) in the body of the email. Files should be in .JPEG unless they are GIFs or videos, and should not exceed 2MB in size for each work. File names should correspond with the work titles. Video submissions can be uploaded onto Youtube or Vimeo for feature on our website. Send these submissions along with a short third-person bio, and (optional) photograph of yourself.

Virtual Reality/ 3D Artworks

For VR Submissions, please submit no more than three (3) individual artworks. For Tilt Brush works, please upload your artwork to Google Poly (https://poly.google.com/), and mark it as ‘public’ (‘remixable’ is at your own preference). A VR/3D artwork can also be submitted as a video export navigating through the artwork. If you prefer this method, please upload your finished video file to YouTube or Vimeo and provide a URL. With either format, please provide a 150 word artist’s statement.

Non-fiction
Non-fiction submissions (essays, reviews, commentary, interviews, etc) should be no more than 1, 500 words and sent as a .doc or .docx file along with your third-person bio/and optional photograph.

Submissions are open until 21st December – and will reopen again on 1st January 2026/for new theme/new editor/s.

BHP online is now in the capable hands of the amazing Matthew Kinlin – friends, arsonistas, send our December 2025 guest editor your magic!

December 1, 2025

NOVEMBER 2025 Guest Editor Is C.C. O’HANLON!!! THEME/S: JOURNEYS

Burning House Press are excited to welcome C.C. O’HANLON as the fifth BHP guest editor of our return series of special editions! As of today C.C. will take over editorship of Burning House Press online for the month of November.

Submissions are open from today 1st November – and will remain open until 25TH November.

C.C.’s theme for the month is as follows

—JOURNEYS

~~~

JOURNEYS: Physical, Psychological, and Imaginary, embracing words and images, in all forms, as well as complexity, resisting the superficial, algorithmic narratives of social media.

~~~

~~~

A self-described ‘vagabond, diarist, and wreck’, C.C. O’Hanlon’s fragmentary memoirs have been published in various anthologies, including Best Australian Essays 2005 and Best Australian Stories 2004 (both published by Black Inc, Australia), A Revealed Life: Australian Writers And Their Journeys In Memoir (ABC Books, Australia), The Odysseum: Strange Journeys That Obliterated Convention (John Murray, U.K.), Zahir: Desire & Eclipse (Zeno Press, U.K.), and Dark Ocean (Dark Mountain Project, U.K.). A founding features editor of Harper’ Bazaar Australia in the late ’80s, his mainstream journalism and images have appeared in The New York Times, The Sydney Morning Herald, Variety, Travel & Leisure, the Australian editions of Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar and scores of other newspapers and magazines.

He now lives a nomadic life with his American wife of 38 years aboard a small, sea-worn old sailboat named Wrack in the southern Mediterranean. They have three adult children.

_______

Submission Guidelines

All submissions should be sent as attachments to guesteditorbhp@gmail.com

Please state the theme and form of your submission in the subject of the email. For example: JOURNEYS/POETRY

Poetry and Fiction

Virtual Reality/ 3D Artworks

Submissions are open until 25th November – and will reopen again on 1st DECEMBER 2025/for new theme/new editor/s.

BHP online is now in the capable hands of the amazing C.C. – friends, arsonistas, send our NOVEMBER 2025 guest editor your magic!

November 1, 2025

Labyrinth / Erasure by Teresa Mestizo

With subtleties broken, / discourses returned / much heavier / A fresh train of disquietudes / sighed often /Sparks of temper; / the puzzle and the plague / But, in full view, / all things in the world / answer consequently: / fallen, rescued / The deepest impression, / a fine truth to any purpose — / that odd legacy / of occasion

Teresa Mestizo is a Chicagoan Xicana currently based in a small
mountainous town in Mexico where she writes, teaches, translates
& makes art. These poems are part of her recent erasure series using
Laurence Sterne’s The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman (1759-1767).
More of her work can be found at teresamestizo.com

October 1, 2025

Ambiguous Dirt by Austin Miles



one much quieter
one much more talkative,

interpreting daylight as if it were a room

			depleted sidewalk wants
		2 tell u (me) some
				thing

	something só imp. It

had to wa
	  it

	a pile of dirt remains ambiguous

laying on the stone like that
	
	can it tell the future?

can the most mundane
	can it (not) shine in my eye?

a rock gets lost but ppl forget

then nothing much done today

sometimes sleep
	but sometimes not.	
washed away
							
an interesting turn of phrase

someone walks into a bar
	but someone
				someone tries to convince me of something
but i’m conversing with a 
			desk lamp

the problem w the world today:
				   
				    the problem w the world today

Austin Miles is from southeast Ohio. He is the author of
the chapbook Perfect Garbage Forever (Bottlecap Press)
and has poems published in Touch the Donkey, Reap Thrill,
Don’t Submit!, and elsewhere.

October 1, 2025

Data Lake (excerpt) by Judson Hamilton

5.
Dusk completes its sundowning as crowds of people begin to congregate. Dark tourism is streamed on the brick walls of the town square. From the sewers: the fatberg sits in silent judgment: Popcorn lungs blooming in the young. Distant bleeps and glitches. A Faraday box stuffed with emotions. New fiberoptics beneath the cobblestones. “10G bae bee! 10G!!” The pale green glow of a billion minds humming beneath these streets. “Shot up some estrogen and grabbed the mic. Never felt so free.” GhostBots™ linger on the edge of the crowds asking if we need resurrecting. We lie supplicate at the open pit. Body heat rises up. Visible by the light of our screens. Easter eggs in a snuff film. *cherry vape clouds* Generational grief pegged to a wildly fluctuating index. <current artery blockage at 65%> The attract screen welcomes us to join the deceased. We line the open mass grave with our phablets. We place them gently along the edge. Our banking details auto-scrolling. Endless digits glowing in the night.

6.
Piles of burning mattresses. Labyrinthine tent cities tunnel deep in the night. Dynamos of madness. Blister packs of fear litter the sidewalk. People slicking their hair back looking to make a name for themselves. Mag-lev handcuffs are issued to citizens of good standing. Making arrests has become de rigueur. “Don’t get left behind – make yours today!” They say, ecoterrorism is back on the menu – whether we like it or not. Try decreasing memory footprint to speed things up. *panicked breathing, faces flush with relief* “It’s ok. It’s ok, guys! It’s all behind login.” Blood boys wandering aimlessly. Leashed to IVs. They skirt the vortex at the center of the town square. They gather in the murk. Peel like shadows off the brick walls. Supplicant and meek they are loaded into trucks. :the fatberg sweats in the dark: Bonfires burning large and bright on every street corner. Feverish dancing, arms flailing. Engagement rates are up! Distant bleeps and glitches. Drones pinging in the night. This is a place where no one wins. “Welcome to the unsubscribe center. You made it!”

7.
Washing bones to arrive at their final incantation. Broken teeth litter the streets. Shattered bottles line the curbs. Burger boxes and Styrofoam clamshells shift and slide along the sidewalk. :the fatberg wheezes from the sewers: “Dark empaths on the prowl” Great is their grift and short is their thrift. The pavement is covered in feces. Broken tents sway in the wind. A yellow sulfurous pollen burns the nostrils. Blankets everything in its stench. Blister packs of disappointment clog the sewer drains. The dispossessed have set up shop at the local mall. All honeycombed out with anguish architecture. Occult practices sold here for a price. *whispering* i’m on the verge. Flickering at the edge of sense. Cut-tongue mumblecore. Agitated. Carbonated. Overstimulated. Wandering the halls looking to score code. Countless stalls in cramped space. Frenetic haggling. Stale sweat and burned pharmaceuticals. JUUL pods litter the tile floor. Stimming on glitterbombs. Tech spells and hexes coded in COBOL. Etsy witches paid in arcade tokens. “Hey there are gravity sinkholes everywhere here so – watch your step.”

Judson Hamilton lives in Wroclaw, Poland.
Bluesky @judsonhamilton.bsky.social
https://neutralspaces.co/judson_hamilton/

September 30, 2025

Motion Picture by Donna Enticknap

15 minute pinhole exposure, handprinted fibre-based silver print

Donna Enticknap works with alternative photographic processes
to create portraits of place and self, exploring ideas of connection to time
and landscape, and the fallibility of human memory.
Bluesky: @auuop.bsky.social Website: https://www.donnaenticknap.com/

September 29, 2025

Two Poems by Corwin Ericson

Sculpture Garden

Brick Professional Building
enislanded by offramps.

Asphalt Curbs Pushed onto the Mulch
by the plow service
spell something broken
in the lot of the brick professional building.

Black Plastic Rat Traps
every twenty paces 
under dead brown junipers
ring the brick professional building.

Box for Patient Samples
bolted to the masonry
outside the back basement door
of the brick professional building.

Five People in Cars Eating by Phonelight
two of them wearing scrubs
each of them alone
behind the brick professional building.

Oft-Gnawed Fisher Price People
collect pathogens
in the children’s corner
of the brick professional building. 

* 
Inholding

Where feral bloodroot blooms
prettily, where knotweed and bittersweet
are bad ideas that have won the meadow
where there are wells and springs
and cairns and cellars
there is a heavy chain and hook
hanging from a maple too old to tap
where her late husband
butchered their cow.

Corwin Ericson is the author of Swell, a novel, and the collection
Checked Out OK. His work has appeared in Volt, Jubilat,
Harpers, and elsewhere.

(Image: Ralph Eugene Meatyard. “Untitled,” 1963. Courtesy of Fraenkel Gallery)

September 29, 2025

Entangled #4 by Damian Ward

Damian Ward’s work explores the subtle interplay between nature, memory,
& the enduring presence of the past. Through a monochromatic lens,
he seeks to distill the landscape to its essential forms.
Bluesky @damianward.bsky.social
www.damianwardphotography.co.uk

September 27, 2025

Subterraneans ii by Paul Hearn

Part-time collagist and amateur bricoleur, Paul has always been infatuated
with pop music and comics. Bluesky @paulxhearn.bsky.social

September 26, 2025

Not For Profit/For Prophecy

Tag