Girl, Drowning by Dana Knott (she/her) is now available as a paperback and PDF (you can order multiple copies at a discount here).

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/girl-drowning-release-dana-knott

The poems within Girl, Drowning were inspired by Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal (1829–1862), a pre-Raphaelite model, muse, poet, and artist. Much attention rests on Siddal’s fame as the model for John Everett Millais’ Ophelia (1851–1852), her laudanum addiction, and the exhumation of her corpse years after her death, so that her husband, artist and poet Dante Gabriel Rossetti, could retrieve a poetry manuscript he placed in her coffin. Girl, Drowning intends to amplify Siddal’s voice and fill in other, rich details of her life, including her aspirations as a poet and artist and her desire for autonomy. Beneath the surface lies a woman who longed to be seen and loved as Siddal, the individual, rather than model, muse, and wife.

Knott, born in Chicago, Illinois, and residing in Delaware, Ohio, works in Columbus as Director of Libraries at the Columbus State Library. In 2021 she launched tiny wren lit, which publishes micropoetry online with downloadable zines for each issue, and in 2024 she published the microchapbook Funeral Flowers (Rinky Dink Press).

Learn more about Knott in a conversation between the author and Melissa Nunez, Yellow Arrow interviewer.

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/muse-mayhem-interview-dana-knott-girl-drowning

‍Cover image and design by Alexa Laharty and interior images by Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal.

Thank you for supporting independent publishing.

Writing Ecopoetry with Joanne Durham

$28 each session or $70 for all 3 sessions (March-May)

The term “ecopoetry” emerged as poets recognized the need to rethink how we respect and protect non-human life. We will read and discuss contemporary poetry that attempts, through a variety of approaches, to contribute to honoring and saving our endangered planet. We’ll spend some time each session drafting poems based on the models provided, with optional sharing.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/writingecopoetry

When: 7-8:30 pm EST

March 24, April 14, May 5

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 3 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $28 each session or $70 for all 3 sessions (March-May)

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Joanne Durham is the author of To Drink from a Wider Bowl, winner of the Sinclair Poetry Prize (Evening Street Press 2022) and the chapbook, On Shifting Shoals (Kelsay 2023). Among her many awards are the Miriam Chaikin Poetry Prize, Third Wednesday’s annual poetry prize, and finalist for the Lascaux Poetry Prize. Over 100 of her poems appear in literary journals

and anthologies, including ecopoems in The Nature of Our Times anthology, Cutthroat, Banyan Review, Cold Mountain Review and others. She brings twenty-five years of teaching experience to her poetry workshops. Learn more about her at https://www.joannedurham.com.

Micro Fiction: Craft and Publish

$30 each session or $75 for all 3 sessions in April

What is micro fiction in the context of a woman's busy and plucky life? In this workshop we will navigate and dissect the 50-word micro fiction/nonfiction art form. Weekly, we will enjoy the quality micro fiction work of other women across culture and identity through a "read, discuss, try it, and prepare for publication" approach. Micro fiction differs from poetry in that it's living prose, but is also related in that it reveals a narrative that is sometimes hard to tell. We will discover how the 50-word piece can pack a punch that is often more effective than longer prose.

There is a market and need for well-written, women-centric micro fiction, and we will unearth it.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/microfiction

When: 6:30 -8:30 pm EST

April 2, April 9, April 16

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 3 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $30 each session or $75 for all 3 sessions in April

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Elaina has seen her poetry, essays, and short stories published across dozens of literary journals. She’s also served as Editor in Chief for installment number two of a micro fiction anthology called 50-word Stories of 2023, while also acting as an acquisitions reader for Vine Leaves Press in the genres of memoir and historical fiction. She is also an active member of the Ocean County chapter for NOW: National Organization for Women.

Over the course of the last two years, Elaina has continued to devote her time to a few very important purposes—her favorite being The Toms River Arts Community (TRAC), bringing to fruition one of her final graduate projects that began as a hypothetical. In June 2025, Elaina collaborated with a two Jersey Shore high schools to collect and curate poetry, paintings, and textiles for a Queer Art Exhibition currently displayed in one of the main gallery windows in downtown Toms River. Future art exhibits for TRAC will call upon Elaina’s writing skills for informational panels and object labels. Elaina also served as communications coordinator for the Trans Equity Coalition’s community social calendar in 2024: a grassroots resource for transgender and nonbinary individuals in New Jersey.

Elaina is a writer, teacher, and graduate student. She wrote a short memoir collection of essays and poetry (Italian Bones in the Snow) and a short story collection (Heart and Salt) both published by Vine Leaves Press. She loves ice cream, antiques, dogs, and actively advocating for LGBTQ+ community. She’s a graduate student through CUNY in Museum Studies. Her newest memoir about growing up with sensory dysregulation in the 1980s and 1990s called Chomp, Press, Pull is a full-on immersive encounter. She loves ice cream, antiques, and fabric patterns.

Poetry is Life

$35 each session or $185 for all 6 sessions (January-June)

In each class we will read and discuss new poets and old favorites who have written gems on our monthly theme. Past themes have included writing about nature, grief, protest, and more. In the class you will write and share new work. You will come away from each session with three or four drafts. Those who commit to the full six sessions will receive the added benefit of an extra workshop session for 30 minutes after the class, to have a new poem workshopped each month. Participants will also have the opportunity to share work with their cohort and the instructor between sessions.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/2026-poetry-life

When: 11:00 am-1:30 pm EST

January 3, February 7, March 14, April 4, May 2, June 6

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 6 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $35 each session or $185 for all 6 sessions (January-June)

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Ann Quinn is the poetry editor for Yellow Arrow Journal and conducts writing workshops at The Writer’s Center, for Yellow Arrow, and at writer’s conferences throughout the country. Ann holds an MFA in poetry from Pacific Lutheran University and lives in Catonsville, Maryland with her family. Her award-winning work can be read in Poet Lore, Potomac Review, Little Patuxent Review, Vietnam War Poetry, Haibun Today, and other journals and is included in the anthology Red Sky: Poetry on the Global Epidemic of Violence Against Women. Her chapbook, Final Deployment, is published by Finishing Line Press. Visit her at annquinn.net.

Micro Fiction: Craft and Publish

$30 each session or $75 for all 3 sessions in April

What is micro fiction in the context of a woman's busy and plucky life? In this workshop we will navigate and dissect the 50-word micro fiction/nonfiction art form. Weekly, we will enjoy the quality micro fiction work of other women across culture and identity through a "read, discuss, try it, and prepare for publication" approach. Micro fiction differs from poetry in that it's living prose, but is also related in that it reveals a narrative that is sometimes hard to tell. We will discover how the 50-word piece can pack a punch that is often more effective than longer prose.

There is a market and need for well-written, women-centric micro fiction, and we will unearth it.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/microfiction

When: 6:30 -8:30 pm EST

April 2, April 9, April 16

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 3 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $30 each session or $75 for all 3 sessions in April

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Elaina has seen her poetry, essays, and short stories published across dozens of literary journals. She’s also served as Editor in Chief for installment number two of a micro fiction anthology called 50-word Stories of 2023, while also acting as an acquisitions reader for Vine Leaves Press in the genres of memoir and historical fiction. She is also an active member of the Ocean County chapter for NOW: National Organization for Women.

Over the course of the last two years, Elaina has continued to devote her time to a few very important purposes—her favorite being The Toms River Arts Community (TRAC), bringing to fruition one of her final graduate projects that began as a hypothetical. In June 2025, Elaina collaborated with a two Jersey Shore high schools to collect and curate poetry, paintings, and textiles for a Queer Art Exhibition currently displayed in one of the main gallery windows in downtown Toms River. Future art exhibits for TRAC will call upon Elaina’s writing skills for informational panels and object labels. Elaina also served as communications coordinator for the Trans Equity Coalition’s community social calendar in 2024: a grassroots resource for transgender and nonbinary individuals in New Jersey.

Elaina is a writer, teacher, and graduate student. She wrote a short memoir collection of essays and poetry (Italian Bones in the Snow) and a short story collection (Heart and Salt) both published by Vine Leaves Press. She loves ice cream, antiques, dogs, and actively advocating for LGBTQ+ community. She’s a graduate student through CUNY in Museum Studies. Her newest memoir about growing up with sensory dysregulation in the 1980s and 1990s called Chomp, Press, Pull is a full-on immersive encounter. She loves ice cream, antiques, and fabric patterns.

Writing Ecopoetry with Joanne Durham

$28 each session or $70 for all 3 sessions (March-May)

The term “ecopoetry” emerged as poets recognized the need to rethink how we respect and protect non-human life. We will read and discuss contemporary poetry that attempts, through a variety of approaches, to contribute to honoring and saving our endangered planet. We’ll spend some time each session drafting poems based on the models provided, with optional sharing.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/writingecopoetry

When: 7-8:30 pm EST

March 24, April 14, May 5

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 3 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $28 each session or $70 for all 3 sessions (March-May)

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Joanne Durham is the author of To Drink from a Wider Bowl, winner of the Sinclair Poetry Prize (Evening Street Press 2022) and the chapbook, On Shifting Shoals (Kelsay 2023). Among her many awards are the Miriam Chaikin Poetry Prize, Third Wednesday’s annual poetry prize, and finalist for the Lascaux Poetry Prize. Over 100 of her poems appear in literary journals

and anthologies, including ecopoems in The Nature of Our Times anthology, Cutthroat, Banyan Review, Cold Mountain Review and others. She brings twenty-five years of teaching experience to her poetry workshops. Learn more about her at https://www.joannedurham.com.

Girl, Drowning by Dana Knott (she/her) is now available for presale as a paperback (you can order multiple copies at a discount here).

yellowarrowpublishing.com/store/girl-drowning-paperback

The poems within Girl, Drowning were inspired by Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal (1829–1862), a pre-Raphaelite model, muse, poet, and artist. Much attention rests on Siddal’s fame as the model for John Everett Millais’ Ophelia (1851–1852), her laudanum addiction, and the exhumation of her corpse years after her death, so that her husband, artist and poet Dante Gabriel Rossetti, could retrieve a poetry manuscript he placed in her coffin. Girl, Drowning intends to amplify Siddal’s voice and fill in other, rich details of her life, including her aspirations as a poet and artist and her desire for autonomy. Beneath the surface lies a woman who longed to be seen and loved as Siddal, the individual, rather than model, muse, and wife.

Knott, born in Chicago, Illinois, and residing in Delaware, Ohio, works in Columbus as Director of Libraries at the Columbus State Library. In 2021 she launched tiny wren lit, which publishes micropoetry online with downloadable zines for each issue, and in 2024 she published the microchapbook Funeral Flowers (Rinky Dink Press).

Learn more about Knott in a conversation between the author and Melissa Nunez, Yellow Arrow interviewer.

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/muse-mayhem-interview-dana-knott-girl-drowning

‍Cover image and design by Alexa Laharty and interior images by Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal.

Thank you for supporting independent publishing.

Poetry is Life

$35 each session or $185 for all 6 sessions (January-June)

In each class we will read and discuss new poets and old favorites who have written gems on our monthly theme. Past themes have included writing about nature, grief, protest, and more. In the class you will write and share new work. You will come away from each session with three or four drafts. Those who commit to the full six sessions will receive the added benefit of an extra workshop session for 30 minutes after the class, to have a new poem workshopped each month. Participants will also have the opportunity to share work with their cohort and the instructor between sessions.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/2026-poetry-life

When: 11:00 am-1:30 pm EST

January 3, February 7, March 14, April 4, May 2, June 6

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 6 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $35 each session or $185 for all 6 sessions (January-June)

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Ann Quinn is the poetry editor for Yellow Arrow Journal and conducts writing workshops at The Writer’s Center, for Yellow Arrow, and at writer’s conferences throughout the country. Ann holds an MFA in poetry from Pacific Lutheran University and lives in Catonsville, Maryland with her family. Her award-winning work can be read in Poet Lore, Potomac Review, Little Patuxent Review, Vietnam War Poetry, Haibun Today, and other journals and is included in the anthology Red Sky: Poetry on the Global Epidemic of Violence Against Women. Her chapbook, Final Deployment, is published by Finishing Line Press. Visit her at annquinn.net.

In partnership with CityLit Project. RSVP here.

Join local publishers The Baltimore Review, Yellow Arrow Publishing, Mason Jar Press, Washington Writers’ Publishing House, Akinoga Press, and Modern Artist Press at Baltimore’s famous Pickles Pub for a fun, fabulous celebration of more than 100 combined years of publishing some of the finest literary work! Grab a beer, sample some true Baltimore grub, and when it’s time for John Waters’s keynote, just walk across the street from Pickles, right back to the Convention Center.

RSVP here.

Join us in person to celebrate a decade of amazing literature with Yellow Arrow Publishing! Enjoy a fun-filled evening featuring readings from our talented authors and connect with fellow book lovers. Don’t miss out on this special milestone event—come raise a glass and share the joy of great stories with us!

This is an official AWP off-site event. It is free and open to the public. Food and drink available (free for limited time and then cash bar for beverages/food). We are thrilled to feature ten readers for ten years of small press publishing!

Let us know you're coming here: https://yap10years.eventbrite.com

For more information, visit aarp.org/events/details.februaries-a-celebration-of-black-voices.64nt7ssh2zg.

Michele Evans, the author of the poetry collection purl, returns with februaries—a chapbook of poems inspired by her participation in the National African American Read-In (AARI) founded by the Black Caucus of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE).

yellowarrowpublishing.com/store/februaries-paperback

Chronicling and preserving the achievements and contributions of ancestors Harriet Tubman, Billie Holiday, Maya Angelou, and others, februaries, a museum constructed of poignant poems diverse in form, reminds readers: Black History is American History, and it should be “celebrated, appreciated, and narrated” well beyond the annual 28-day observance.

Inspired by the literary tradition established by an assembly of living legends from the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, such as Dr. Joanne V. Gabbin and E. Ethelbert Miller, Evans, a fifth-generation Washingtonian (D.C.) and English teacher, revisits significant and complicated moments from America’s past to spark necessary and challenging conversations about the future of humanity.

Michele Evans, the author of the poetry collection purl, returns with februaries—a chapbook of poems inspired by her participation in the National African American Read-In (AARI) founded by the Black Caucus of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE).

yellowarrowpublishing.com/store/februaries-paperback

Chronicling and preserving the achievements and contributions of ancestors Harriet Tubman, Billie Holiday, Maya Angelou, and others, februaries, a museum constructed of poignant poems diverse in form, reminds readers: Black History is American History, and it should be “celebrated, appreciated, and narrated” well beyond the annual 28-day observance.

Inspired by the literary tradition established by an assembly of living legends from the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, such as Dr. Joanne V. Gabbin and E. Ethelbert Miller, Evans, a fifth-generation Washingtonian (D.C.) and English teacher, revisits significant and complicated moments from America’s past to spark necessary and challenging conversations about the future of humanity.

For more information and to register, see toasttab.com/local/order/daydrift-episcope-jshwe.

Michele Evans, the author of the poetry collection purl, returns with februaries—a chapbook of poems inspired by her participation in the National African American Read-In (AARI) founded by the Black Caucus of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE).

yellowarrowpublishing.com/store/februaries-paperback

Chronicling and preserving the achievements and contributions of ancestors Harriet Tubman, Billie Holiday, Maya Angelou, and others, februaries, a museum constructed of poignant poems diverse in form, reminds readers: Black History is American History, and it should be “celebrated, appreciated, and narrated” well beyond the annual 28-day observance.

Inspired by the literary tradition established by an assembly of living legends from the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, such as Dr. Joanne V. Gabbin and E. Ethelbert Miller, Evans, a fifth-generation Washingtonian (D.C.) and English teacher, revisits significant and complicated moments from America’s past to spark necessary and challenging conversations about the future of humanity.

Michele Evans, the author of the poetry collection purl, returns with februaries—a chapbook of poems inspired by her participation in the National African American Read-In (AARI) founded by the Black Caucus of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE).

yellowarrowpublishing.com/store/februaries-paperback

Chronicling and preserving the achievements and contributions of ancestors Harriet Tubman, Billie Holiday, Maya Angelou, and others, februaries, a museum constructed of poignant poems diverse in form, reminds readers: Black History is American History, and it should be “celebrated, appreciated, and narrated” well beyond the annual 28-day observance.

Inspired by the literary tradition established by an assembly of living legends from the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, such as Dr. Joanne V. Gabbin and E. Ethelbert Miller, Evans, a fifth-generation Washingtonian (D.C.) and English teacher, revisits significant and complicated moments from America’s past to spark necessary and challenging conversations about the future of humanity.

Poetry is Life

$35 each session or $185 for all 6 sessions (January-June)

In each class we will read and discuss new poets and old favorites who have written gems on our monthly theme. Past themes have included writing about nature, grief, protest, and more. In the class you will write and share new work. You will come away from each session with three or four drafts. Those who commit to the full six sessions will receive the added benefit of an extra workshop session for 30 minutes after the class, to have a new poem workshopped each month. Participants will also have the opportunity to share work with their cohort and the instructor between sessions.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/2026-poetry-life

When: 11:00 am-1:30 pm EST

January 3, February 7, March 14, April 4, May 2, June 6

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 6 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $35 each session or $185 for all 6 sessions (January-June)

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Ann Quinn is the poetry editor for Yellow Arrow Journal and conducts writing workshops at The Writer’s Center, for Yellow Arrow, and at writer’s conferences throughout the country. Ann holds an MFA in poetry from Pacific Lutheran University and lives in Catonsville, Maryland with her family. Her award-winning work can be read in Poet Lore, Potomac Review, Little Patuxent Review, Vietnam War Poetry, Haibun Today, and other journals and is included in the anthology Red Sky: Poetry on the Global Epidemic of Violence Against Women. Her chapbook, Final Deployment, is published by Finishing Line Press. Visit her at annquinn.net.

februaries by Michele Evans is now available for release as a paperback (you can order multiple copies at a discount here) at yellowarrowpublishing.com/store/februaries-paperback.

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/februaries-release-michele-evans

Evans, the author of the poetry collection purl, returns with februaries—a chapbook of poems inspired by her participation in the National African American Read-In (AARI) founded by the Black Caucus of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE).

Chronicling and preserving the achievements and contributions of ancestors Harriet Tubman, Billie Holiday, Maya Angelou, and others, februaries, a museum constructed of poignant poems diverse in form, reminds readers: Black History is American History, and it should be “celebrated, appreciated, and narrated” well beyond the annual 28-day observance.

Inspired by the literary tradition established by an assembly of living legends from the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, such as Dr. Joanne V. Gabbin and E. Ethelbert Miller, Evans, a fifth-generation Washingtonian (D.C.) and English teacher, revisits significant and complicated moments from America’s past to spark necessary and challenging conversations about the future of humanity.

Learn more about Evans in a conversation between the author and Melissa Nunez, Yellow Arrow interviewer.

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/legacy-bloom-interview-michele-evans-februaries

Cover and interior art by Harrison Evans and cover design by Alexa Laharty.

Thank you for supporting independent publishing.

Yellow Arrow Publishing is excited to announce that submissions for our next issue of Yellow Arrow Journal, Vol. XI, No. 1 (spring 2026) are open February 1-28, exploring the interplay between curiosity and creativity and how it informs discovery in the personal creative process and encourages artistry and fulfillment for women-identifying writers.

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/yaj-xi-01-submissions-open-wonder

The first issue of volume XI will reflect on this idea through the issue’s theme WONDER

(noun)

: a cause of astonishment or admiration (a marvel or a miracle)

: the quality of exciting amazed admiration

(verb)

: to be curious or in doubt about

: to feel surprise, curiosity, or doubt

Here are some guiding questions about the topic and theme:

1.     How is your creative process influenced by curiosity? For example, by subjects or motifs you return to, by what you desire to explore, or by what you’re hesitant to explore?

2.     How do curiosity and creativity help shape the person you hope to be? What have you discovered about yourself?

3.     Was there a defining moment in your life that sparked your writing journey because you wondered where it might lead?

4.     Are you curious about breaking from your typical forms or genres? How do curiosity, uncertainty, or discoveries lead you to experimentation of form?

5.     What light do you hope your curiosity and creativity sparks within others?

For more information regarding journal submission guidelines, visit yellowarrowpublishing.com/submissions. Please read our guidelines carefully before submitting. To learn more about our editorial views and how important your voice is in your story, read About the Journal. This issue will be released in May 2026. To learn more about WONDER’s guest editor, Heather Brown Barrett, visit yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/curiosity-creativity-guest-editor-yaj-xi-01-barrett.

Thank you for supporting independent publishing.

Yellow Arrow is excited to announce the theme for our next issue

This issue will explore the interplay between curiosity and creativity and how it informs discovery in the personal creative process and encourages artistry and fulfillment for women-identifying writers. The guest editor for WONDER will be Heather Brown Barrett.

Heather is an award-winning poet in southeastern Virginia. She mothers her young son and contemplates life, the universe, and everything with her writer husband. She is a Cherokee Nation citizen, the membership chair of The Poetry Society of Virginia, a member of The Muse Writers Center, and a former board member of Hampton Roads Writers. Her work has appeared in Literary Mama, The Ekphrastic Review, Yellow Arrow Journal, formidable Woman sanctuary, Black Bough Poetry, OyeDrum Magazine, and elsewhere and has been nominated for Best of the Net. Her poetry is featured in the global TELEPHONE exhibition and was previously featured on the Dahlgren Railroad Heritage Trail as part of The Poetry Society of Virginia’s Poetry on the Trail project and in the Suffolk Center for Cultural Arts Everyone Has a Story exhibit. Much of her work is influenced by themes and dualities of motherhood, modes of forgiveness and grace, and the types of subjects that plague most poets, like death, grocery stores, and birds. She’s the author of Water in Every Room (Kelsay Books, 2025), a collection of poems embodying the fluctuations of emotion and form in new motherhood.

To learn more about our submissions guidelines, visit yellowarrowpublishing.com/submissions. Thank you for supporting independent publishing.

Yellow Arrow Publishing would like to announce the next guest editor for Yellow Arrow Journal, Heather Brown Barrett. Heather will oversee the creation of our Vol. XI, No. 1 issue (spring 2026).

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/curiosity-creativity-guest-editor-yaj-xi-01-barrett

Heather Brown Barrett is an award-winning poet in southeastern Virginia. She mothers her young son and contemplates life, the universe, and everything with her writer husband. She is a Cherokee Nation citizen, the membership chair of The Poetry Society of Virginia, a member of The Muse Writers Center, and a former board member of Hampton Roads Writers. Her work has appeared in Literary Mama, The Ekphrastic Review, Yellow Arrow Journal, formidable Woman sanctuary, Black Bough Poetry, OyeDrum Magazine, and elsewhere and has been nominated for Best of the Net. Her poetry is featured in the global TELEPHONE exhibition and was previously featured on the Dahlgren Railroad Heritage Trail as part of The Poetry Society of Virginia’s Poetry on the Trail project and in the Suffolk Center for Cultural Arts Everyone Has a Story exhibit. Much of her work is influenced by themes and dualities of motherhood, modes of forgiveness and grace, and the types of subjects that plague most poets, like death, grocery stores, and birds. She’s the author of Water in Every Room (Kelsay Books, 2025), a collection of poems embodying the fluctuations of emotion and form in new motherhood.

This next issue of Yellow Arrow Journal will explore the interplay between curiosity and creativity and how it informs discovery in the personal creative process and encourages artistry and fulfillment for women-identifying writers.

MARK YOUR CALENDARS:

• Theme announcement: January 26

• Submissions open: February 1

• Submissions close: February 28

• Issue release: May 19

Each year, staff and board at Yellow Arrow come together to select our value for the year—one word that reflects where we currently are on our journey and one that encompasses all that we are embracing and aspiring to in the year ahead.

This year’s theme is LUMINATE. Learn more about our mission to blaze a path for women-identifying voices this year at yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/luminate-yellow-arrow-2026-value.

februaries by Michele Evans is now available for prerelease as a paperback (you can order multiple copies at a discount here).

yellowarrowpublishing.com/store/februaries-paperback

Evans, the author of the poetry collection purl, returns with februaries—a chapbook of poems inspired by her participation in the National African American Read-In (AARI) founded by the Black Caucus of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE).

Chronicling and preserving the achievements and contributions of ancestors Harriet Tubman, Billie Holiday, Maya Angelou, and others, februaries, a museum constructed of poignant poems diverse in form, reminds readers: Black History is American History, and it should be “celebrated, appreciated, and narrated” well beyond the annual 28-day observance.

Inspired by the literary tradition established by an assembly of living legends from the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, such as Dr. Joanne V. Gabbin and E. Ethelbert Miller, Evans, a fifth-generation Washingtonian (D.C.) and English teacher, revisits significant and complicated moments from America’s past to spark necessary and challenging conversations about the future of humanity.

Learn more about Evans in a conversation between the author and Melissa Nunez, Yellow Arrow interviewer.

yellowarrowpublishing.com/news/legacy-bloom-interview-michele-evans-februaries

Cover and interior art by Harrison Evans and cover design by Alexa Laharty.

Thank you for supporting independent publishing.

Poetry is Life

$35 each session or $185 for all 6 sessions (January-June)

In each class we will read and discuss new poets and old favorites who have written gems on our monthly theme. Past themes have included writing about nature, grief, protest, and more. In the class you will write and share new work. You will come away from each session with three or four drafts. Those who commit to the full six sessions will receive the added benefit of an extra workshop session for 30 minutes after the class, to have a new poem workshopped each month. Participants will also have the opportunity to share work with their cohort and the instructor between sessions.

https://www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sign-up/p/2026-poetry-life

When: 11:00 am-1:30 pm EST

January 3, February 7, March 14, April 4, May 2, June 6

You are strongly encouraged to register for the full 6 sessions. However, you are invited to attend one session at a time as you are available.

Cost: $35 each session or $185 for all 6 sessions (January-June)

Where: Zoom (link provided after registration)

Class Size: 15 participants

About the instructor:

Ann Quinn is the poetry editor for Yellow Arrow Journal and conducts writing workshops at The Writer’s Center, for Yellow Arrow, and at writer’s conferences throughout the country. Ann holds an MFA in poetry from Pacific Lutheran University and lives in Catonsville, Maryland with her family. Her award-winning work can be read in Poet Lore, Potomac Review, Little Patuxent Review, Vietnam War Poetry, Haibun Today, and other journals and is included in the anthology Red Sky: Poetry on the Global Epidemic of Violence Against Women. Her chapbook, Final Deployment, is published by Finishing Line Press. Visit her at annquinn.net.

The Pushcart Prize represents an incredible opportunity for Yellow Arrow to further showcase and support our authors. Our staff is committed to letting our authors shine. Every writer has a story to tell and every story is worth telling. We are so proud of everyone we publish at Yellow Arrow. Without further ado, let’s meet the Yellow Arrow 2026 Pushcart Prize Nominees!

Emily Decker is a writer in Baltimore, Maryland. Her poems have appeared in Yellow Arrow Journal, Full Bleed, Hole in the Head Review, and Campfire Stories: Chesapeake Bay. Her debut collection Homing: Poems is available through Yellow Arrow. She holds a bachelor’s degree in literature and a master’s degree in secondary English education from Georgia State University. When she’s not writing or reading, she is usually out on the Chesapeake Bay, on or behind a stage, or plotting her next adventure. Follow Emily on Instagram @emadeck or at emilydeckerpoetry.com. We nominated “Finding Home in a Villanelle” from Homing: Poems.

Johanna Elattar is a writer from Brooklyn whose work explores memory, faith, and resilience through intimate, character-driven storytelling. Influenced by early childhood experiences in Alexandria and a life shaped by displacement, survival, and devotion to truth, she writes toward quiet revelations and the subtle moments that define a life. Her writing has appeared in Yellow Arrow Journal, Lunch Ticket, Muslim Matters, and other publications, and she was recently featured in an Oxford University Press anthology. Elattar believes in the dignity of ordinary lives, the endurance of the human spirit, and the duty to bear witness. She currently lives in upstate New York with her rescue animals and is at work on a novella. Her CNF “Under the Siren: Alexandria, 1973” from Yellow Arrow Journal KAIROS was nominated for the Pushcart.

Ann marie Houghtailing has a graduate’s degree (ALM) in American literature from Harvard University Extension. She has delivered a TEDx Talk entitled Raising Humans, and performed her critically acclaimed one woman show, Renegade Princess, in New York, Chicago, Santa Fe, San Francisco, and San Diego. Houghtailing is a visual artist and cofounder of the firm Story Imprinting. Her writing has appeared in the Washington Post, Huffington Post, Daily Worth, XO Jane, San Diego Business Journal, Yahoo! Finance, and Thought Catalog. Ann marie’s chapbook Little by Little was released in April 2025 and can be found in the Yellow Arrow bookstore. Yellow Arrow nominated “Little by Little” from Little by Little.

Majiq Vu Mai (magic/they/he/we) is a multiplicity of madness, writing themselves alive. An alchemist of flesh and memory, they write whatever burns inside of them like a searing ache and find relief in giving voice to their truths through language. For Majiq—we write to collect the pieces of ourselves we have lost along the way and to remember our possibilities through the creative act of storytelling. We nominated Majiq’s CNF “The Metamorphosis” from Yellow Arrow Journal UNFURL for the Pushcart.

Vic Nogay is a Pushcart Prize and Best Microfiction nominated writer from Ohio. Her work has been published in Gone Lawn, Tiny Molecules, Fractured Lit, Lost Balloon, and other journals. She is the author of the micropoetry chapbook under fire under water (tiny wren, 2022) and is the microeditor of Identity Theory. Find her online @vicnogaywrites or haunting rural roadsides where the wildflowers grow. Vic’s chapbook Naming a Dying Thing was released in October 2025 and can be found in the Yellow Arrow bookstore. We nominated “Appalachians” from Naming a Dying Thing.

Thank you to everyone who supports these women and all writers who toil away day after day. Please show them some love in the comments below or on Yellow Arrow’s Facebook or Instagram.

Yellow Arrow Publishing is a nonprofit supporting women writers through publication and access to the literary arts. To learn more about publishing, volunteering, or donating, visit yellowarrowpublishing.com.