“Resurgence is the force of the life of the forest, its ability to spread its seeds and roots and runners to reclaim places that have been deforested. … In the contemporary world, we know how to block resurgence. But this hardly seems a good enough reason to stop noticing its possibilities.” – Anna Tsing
“In the wastelands, our freedom comes from falling in love with the beauty in lands, places, and people where others have been taught to see only weeds and devastation. When we make a home in lands and bodies considered wastelands, we attest that these places are worthy of healing and that we are worthy of life beyond survival.” – Erica Violet Lee
“Where there appears to be only dirt, there may be the root system of some kind of insistent thriving.” – Camille T. Dungy
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Unearthed Returns! Submit to the Spring 2024 Issue
We’re thrilled to announce the revival of Unearthed. Like a field left fallow for a season to rest, ESF’s literary and art magazine is now ready for a fresh new editorial team to breathe new life back into its pages. And we can’t wait for you to join us!
We invite writers, poets, artists, and creatives to submit to our upcoming Spring 2024 issue, exploring the themes of resurgence, restoration, and renewal.
We encourage you to interpret the theme broadly. We welcome fiction, nonfiction, poetry, visual art, photo essays, and short films that attend to places of quiet resurgence, unexpected healing, and ongoing survivance. While we believe that attention to the possibility of revival is its own powerful form of resistance, we understand that over-simplified celebrations of peoples, individuals, or ecosystems that overcome adversity can obscure structural inequities and reinforce damaging stereotypes about “naturalness” and “normality.” With this mind, we are also open to work that complicates or even critiques concepts like “resilience,” “restoration,” and “healing.” We are eager to learn how the theme speaks to you, and we hope to be surprised by your unique perspective.
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Submission Guidelines
Genre: Open to fiction, non-fiction, poetry, visual art, and any creative expression.
- Poetry: up to five poems (one poem on a page), submitted as .doc, .docx, or .pdf.
- Fiction: up to 6,000 words (double-spaced), submitted as .doc, .docx, or .pdf. Include a title and page numbers.
- Creative and critical non-fiction: between 800-6,000 words (double-spaced), submitted as .doc, .docx, or .pdf. Include a title and page numbers.
- Visual Art: up to ten items, formatted as .jpg, .tiff , .png, or .pdf with a minimum resolution of 300 dpi and at least five inches wide. Include titles for each piece.
- Video: up to two video products submitted in .wav, .wmv, .avi, or .mov. or a link to a previously unpublished vimeo, etc.
Cover Letter & Artist Statement: Please attach a short cover letter (.doc, .docx, or .pdf.) that includes: 1. a short biographical statement of 100 words or less; 2. A brief artist statement of 150 words or less in which you briefly describe any or all of the following: what inspired the piece, what you hope audiences take from it, how your work fits into (or chafes against) the theme. If your submission is chosen for publication, we will publish your bio and your artist statement alongside your piece.
Submission Deadline: February 29, 2024.
How to Submit: Email your submission to with the subject line: “Resurgence 2024 Submission – [Your Name].”
Simultaneous Submissions: We allow simultaneous submissions but please notify us if your work is accepted elsewhere.