Call for Submissions
Submission Guidelines for GLEAM
We are currently accepting submissions for Issue 2 of GLEAM. We invite you to submit up to three, previously-unpublished cadralore. Please familiarize yourself with the form and enjoy reading our Inaugural Issue.
Please scroll to the bottom and check out Gleam’s submissions guidelines, tips on what the editors are looking for, and where to send your cadralore.
Rules for Submission:
- There are no submission or reading fees at Gleam.
- Gleam is not a paying publication, and is an online-only journal.
- Gleam does not publish hate speech; do not waste your time, or ours, by submitting it.
- Please do not submit poems that are not cadralore. Gleam is a journal devoted solely to this form.
What are we looking for?
What are Gleam‘s editors looking for in your cadralor? This is the list of criteria we use when we read submissions. We take them seriously, and hope you will, too:
- Five numbered stanzas, each ideally the same number of lines (some liberties allowed with the latter, but not the former). Titles for each stanza are optional.
- Each stanza is image-based, showing rather than telling (absolutely no room on this)
- Each stanza is strong enough to stand on its own as a poem we’d consider publishing outside of its role in this poem (no room on this one either)
- Something in each stanza should make us draw in our breath. We say, “this line killed me” a lot. If we’re seeing stanzas in which nothing “kills us,” the poem is likely not a cadralor
- The unrelatedness of the stanzas is very important. Often, there IS a visible relatedness, but the poem should not be a clear narrative. Ideally, the poem takes us places we aren’t expecting, and in the end we must figure out how we got there. The best cadralore should shock us, cut our hands, leave us gasping. The riskier the jump from stanza to stanza, the stronger the poem. Safety doesn’t really factor into these poems; We’ve already rejected several submissions that don’t take any risks.
- The fifth stanza is crucial. Even in its unrelatedness, it illuminates the thread. If it doesn’t do this, it doesn’t answer the question, “For what do you yearn?” and the poem is not a cadralor. Also, the cadralor is not a mashup of other forms. The fifth stanza is not a collection of lines from the other stanzas. We’ve seen a few of those and immediately rejected them. That’s not the purpose of the fifth stanza. The fifth stanza must “stick the landing;” it crystalizes the yearning of the entire piece and makes it one poem.
Poem Submission
We are currently accepting submissions for Issue 2 of Gleam as of January 15th, 2021. Please attach your cadralore in Word document form to an email with the subject line: “Gleam Submission.” Include a third-person author bio of no more than 100 words in the body of your email. Also in your email, please indicate whether you would like editorial feedback for revision if we feel your cadralore merit a “revise and resubmit.”
Send your poems and bio to GLEAM EIC, Lori Howe, at gleampoets@gmail.com or use the button below.
About Us
Gleam is a journal wholly devoted to the new poetic form, the cadralor. Co-created by three of Gleam’s editors, the cadralor consists of five short, unrelated, highly-visual stanzas.
Get In Touch
If you are interested in submitting your own cadralor poem or if you have questions, you can reach out to our Gleam email. We look forward to hearing from you!
Meet the Editors
The cadralor was co-created by:
Lori Howe, Editor in Chief
Christopher Cadra, Senior Editor
Mary Carroll-Hackett, Contributing Editor
