Volume 09, Chapter 10 | August 2022

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Image by John Crozier

Dear writers, readers and friends,

We have had an influx of submissions from new writers (is it the Euro heatwave?!) and with this came lots of enquiries about when to expect confirmation if a piece is published. A gentle reminder that we do not notify writers when a piece is published. We read over 150 subs every month and publish 100 of them. We would love to notify each and every one of you but there’s simply no time. We appreciate this is annoying, so here is a reminder of how you can keep track of your submission:

1. Check visualverse.org (https://www.visualverse.org) regularly. If published, your piece will go up on visualveres.org some time before the end of the month.
2. Create a Google Alert (https://www.google.com/alerts) or similar for your name, to be notified when your piece appears.
3. Search the Archive (https://visualverse.org/images/) . All past issues are kept here and all published writers are listed on the left, alphabetically by first name.

Do you have other bright ideas for monitoring your submissions? We’d love to hear them. Send us an email or Tweet us @visual_verse so we can share your tips with other writers.

Now, to the fun stuff. From our new HQ downunder, we are feeling nostalgic for the UK and Europe. The antidote is a deep-dive into Australia’s artist and writer talent pool. We kick off the issue with an image, by John Crozier, of London’s infamous Underground alongside words by Australian writer Eloise Grills (https://www.eloisegrills.com/) . Eloise is an award-winning writer and artist living in Daylesford, Victoria. Her collection of illustrated essays, big beautiful female theory, is out now with Affirm Press. She tweets and grams as

On page 2, we’re delighted to highlight the work of Luís Costa (he/they) who has been bringing some beautiful words to VV of late. Luís is, among many things, an anxious queer poet living in London. Longlisted for the 2022 Out-Spoken Prize, his recent and forthcoming work can be found in Stone of Madness, Inksounds, Queerlings, Farside Review, FEED and here on Visual Verse. Luís holds a PhD from Goldsmiths, University of London, and likes Baroque music, numbers and wine. He tweets @captainiberia (http://www.twitter.com/captainiberia) .
And on page 3, we welcome Mitra Visveswaran, a Visual Verse writing prize winner. Mitra is a 24 year old artist, poet and student of psychology from Chennai, India, and we are loving watching her work grow and develop.

So, dear writers, let’s see what you make of this month’s image. I love that we can’t begin to predict your responses to this one. Surprise us. And, more importantly, surprise yourselves.

The image is the starting point, the text is up to you.

Kristen
with Lucie, Isabel, Preti and the VV Team

Follow us on Twitter
@visual_verse (https://twitter.com/visual_verse)

Volume 09, Chapter 08 | June 2022

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Image by Reed Geiger

Dear writers, readers and friends,

Thank you for your patience as we find our feet with our new trans-continental team constellation. The Visual Verse home is now Melbourne, Australia, while our chief editors are in Sydney (Lucie Stevens) and London (Isabel Brookes). We will shortly put a call out for new editorial volunteers, who can be based anywhere in the world, so stay tuned if you are interested in joining our team.

For June we present a small, perfectly formed issue that takes us back to our roots. Our image, which comes to us from 20-year-old US photographer/designer Reed Geiger (https://reedgeiger23.wixsite.com/my-site) , is intriguing and somewhat quirky, just as we like them. And our two lead writers have produced a perfect duet of poems in response.

On page one, we are thrilled to showcase Giovanna MacKenna (http://www.giovannamackenna.com) who celebrates the launch of her first poetry collection this month. Giovanna grew up on Scotland’s west coast and has built her life around words. She is a published and commissioned poet and her first full collection, How the Heart can Falter, is now out with The Museum of Loss and Renewal Publishing (http://themuseumoflossandrenewal.life/publications-and-editions/) . Join her at the launch event, along with Christina Thatcher (see below) and Claire Askew, from 7p.m. UK time on Wednesday, June 8th. Tickets are available from Eventbrite (https://www.eventbrite.com/e/giovanna-mackenna-book-launch-and-poetry-readings-tickets-344035337957) . For more information on Giovanna’s work and past publications visit her website (http://www.giovannamackenna.com) or follow her on twitter/insta @giovmacpoet.

On page two we present the wonderful words of Christina Thatcher (http://christinathatcher.com) , a Creative Writing Lecturer at Cardiff Metropolitan University. Her poetry and short stories have featured in over 50 publications including Ambit, Magma, Poetry Wales, The London Magazine and more. She has published two poetry collections with Parthian Books: More than you were (2017) and How to Carry Fire (2020). As mentioned above, Christina will be joining Giovanna at the launch event on June 8th and we encourage you all to sign up and attend to hear these hugely talented writers read their work.

Speaking of talented writers, we are delighted to see many new writers coming to Visual Verse in recent months. We thought it might be a good moment to refresh you all on how we work, and how to get the most out of Visual Verse.

Before you submit… remember that the challenge is to write between 50-500 words in response to our image prompt, within one hour. Only new work that demonstrates a connection to the image will be accepted. You can check the guidelines on our website (https://visualverse.org/submission-guidelines/) to ensure your piece doesn’t break any of our rules. Pieces must be submitted by the 15th of each month.

After you submit… check visualverse.org regularly to see if your piece is published. We will publish up to a maximum of 100 pieces throughout the month. We cannot notify individual writers as we get so many submissions, so you may find it helpful to set up a Google Alert to get an automatic notification.

If you are published… you will see your piece appear at visualverse.org. This will be visible on the homepage until the next issue is published, after which it will go into the Archive (https://visualverse.org/images/) . In the Archive, you can find your work any time by either clicking on the image for the issue, or by clicking your name in the Author list on the left-hand side (alphabetical by first name).

You can also find your work using the following address in your browser:
https://visualverse.org/writers/your-name/
Example: https://visualverse.org/writers/giovanna-mackenna/
(use a hyphen to separate names)

Work published at Visual Verse remains copyright of the writer (you), therefore you are free to publish your pieces elsewhere, re-develop them into longer or different works, or submit them to anthologies.

OK folks, that’s it! We hope you are inspired by our image and writing this month as it’s now your turn. The image is the starting point, the text is up to you.

The VV team

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@visual_verse (https://twitter.com/visual_verse)
@giovmacpoet (https://twitter.com/giovmacpoet)
@writetoempower (https://twitter.com/writetoempower)