allies and enemies, welcome to Burial Magazine. congratulations on finding us, we barely exist; you have passed the first test.
we aim to publish sharpened and original works of literature: prose pieces of more than 999 words (which is to say, 1000+ words) and poems with less than 21 lines (so, 20 lines max—and yeah, keep it to lineated poetry, please, prose poems will be a very hard sell here and this site hates justified text). wish we could say we have some crazy story behind the 'Burial' name, we just enjoy the music of william emmanuel bevan.
(oh, and by we, i mean me, z.h. gill, i am the only one here, but it can be thrilling to pretend. [fyi, this here's a link to my personal website, which can guide you to a selection of my own writings, if you want some idea of the sensibilities i attempt to inhabit in my work. but i enjoy all sorts of stuff, my taste is eclectic and so shall Burial Magazine be.])
send one piece at a time to burialmageditor@gmail.com in an attached word doc. original work only, though exceptions may be made to rehouse pieces from obliterated publications. specify in the subject line of your email if your submission is poetry or prose to save us from some headaches on our end, but be aware your work will not be categorized in any such way upon publication, it will simply appear down below. only one poem or story (or whatever else it is) at a time, please. if you send a packet, only the first piece within shall be considered.
Burial Magazine longs for a Free Palestine: donate to the Middle East Children's Alliance if you are able. (putting this here because it's the right thing to do and also because we're especially uninterested in the grifterchud mode of writing so rampant today, this seems like a good deterrent to that.)
please wait at least 5 years to submit again if your work is accepted. seriously. no real reason for this, we just think it's funny. because of the slow nature of this project, we will unfortunately reject much, much, much, much, much more work than we'll accept. don't feel bad if we don't take your work, seriously, we're looking for something quite specific in effect. and feel free to keep submitting until we do take your work.
don't care about proper cover letters here, but include a brief bio (like, in the third person perspective? and if you're writing from/have in roots in southern california, be sure to mention it, as your work will receive special attention) with your submission in the body of your email and indicate if you're willing to take editorial suggestions. declining them (probably) does not preclude you from publication in Burial Magazine. we're also happy to give (light) notes/thoughts on rejected stories by request. (most likely won't have suggestions for rejected poems, that's more of a 'know it when we see it' thing, but you're free to ask, we won't begrudge you.)
response times will vary; sometimes, they can be quite a while, especially for prose work. please note and internalize that delays in response are not a sign of disinterest in your work.
despite the quiet, we are always open to new submissions. (and you will get a response to your submission, even if it takes a long-ass time. we hate that shit where you don't.)
while we are largely agnostic to genre, we likely and regrettably cannot handle novel or eccentric formatting (especially in verse) due to our extremely limited web design skills. text only, please. we welcome translated work with the proper permissions.
we'll never have a presence on social media in any form; however, our editor will share published pieces across his personal channels, many of which happen to be named—entirely by coincidence—@burialmagazine. because of this, including your social media handles with your submission is very helpful.
we typically publish on mondays and fridays; sometimes we will publish a bit more than that in a single week, sometimes less. we cannot pay our contributors now, and let's not kid ourselves, we'll never be able to, we're in it for the love of the game here, plus the glory. but we'll also never charge you to submit. rights revert to our authors after publication, but please acknowledge Burial Magazine as the first home to your work if it is reprinted elsewhere. simultaneous submissions are presumed, but let us know if work under consideration here is accepted for publication at another outlet—really, please, please do that. (and congrats if you land it somewhere else, obviously! this shit is hard, the odds are often against even the very best.)
there is no wiggle room on the aforementioned word count/line requirements.
now please enjoy some selected contemporary writings of strange power and originality haha.