Dear Reader,
Welcome to this latest instalment of the Fahmidan newsletter where our mission is always to be drivers of diversity in action! We’re humbled by your continued support and look forward to reading your work. We’ve now had over 7000 submission packets, and well over 25,000 individual pieces, since we reopened as a paying journal in September 2023! Thank you for submitting, reading and being part of the Fahmidan Family where diversity isn’t jargon and chit chat, but progressive action and accessible support.
You can expect reviews, reader wishes, as well as submission opportunity updates and other monthly musings. We have also recently launched our Chapbook Editing/Feedback Service, Editor Consultations and offer Editorial Feedback. As a completely self-funded literary journal and publishing house, we appreciate all support to continue our mission of practicing Diversity in Action.
You can request Chapbook Editing/ Consultations: here
Issue 21 is now out! Why not check it out for free here.
You can also check out our archive of issues here.
Launching Fahmidan Education
Education Spotlight
“Seeing my hole, I know my whole”- April 13 12:00 p.m.-2:00 p.m. PST with Cass Garison & Ally Ang
From holes we came and into holes we shall return. The hole is the ultimate abject, the transgressable boundary between the self and itself, other selves, the world, the divine. Come join us in reading various hole poems and writing your own hole poems, assisted by holesome prompts.
The Sacred and the Profane: Blending the Everyday and the Spiritual in Writing.- April 26th 2025 12PM-3PM EST with Donna J Vorreyer
The main definition of profane simply refers to the secular world, all the parts of a life that are not directly related to spiritual or religious practice. However you may define the spiritual in your own life, what might happen in our writing if we blend the sacred and the profane to make a liminal world where these two things coexist? Looking at poems by Kaveh Akbar, Danez Smith, Li-Young Lee, and others, we will discuss how writers use sensory image, ritual description, prayer structure, giving of thanks and much more!
Repetitious, Obsessive, & Recursive Poetic Practice-May 3 & May 10 12:00pm-2:00pm PST with Cass Garison (2 sessions)
In this workshop, we will explore repetition, recursion, and the obsessive return to images, phrases, and ideas. We’ll examine with poetic incantation, insistence, and fixation through micro-lessons, readings, discussions, and generative exercises that encourage experimentation with recursive techniques and connection with our own instinctive rhythms. Prompts and lessons will invite us to build new repetitious tactics while indulging individual poetic obsession.
The Chapbook Editing & Publishing Process- May 23rd 2025, 11am-12.45pm EST with A.R.Arthur
Producing a Chapbook is a rite of passage for any writer and is often a considerably challenging feat that takes time, dedication and re-writes. But how does this work? What decisions impact Press Selection and how are Chapbooks crafted and formatted? In this workshop, we will walk you through the formatting, submitting and publication process from start to finish. The core goal of this workshop is to provide you with the tools, tips, tricks and knowledge to collate, format, submit and publish your very own Chapbook collection. For the final 20 minutes of this session, questions will be taken to answer all questions.
The Art of Losing: Poetic Failure -May 25th 1PM EST with CD Eskilson
In a world full of everyday disappointments, how can our writing lean into defeat and capture a sense of frustration or catastrophe? This poetry workshop will look at the ways writers have represented personal or political shortcomings and written back to the fiascos, debacles, or mistakes that follow them in life. We will pay special attention to how “failed” poetic forms can exemplify disaster in our writing and the various ways we might amplify a poem’s sense of risk or rupture. We will read poems by Nicky Beer, Cindy Juyoung Ok, sam sax, and others, paying close attention to craft elements such as description, metaphor, and poetic tension.
Workshops by Elizabeth M Castillo, Donna J. Vorreyer, Cass Garison, Aly Ang & A.R.Arthur and more!
Sign Up: here.
Launching the Inagural Fahmidan Amsterdam Retreat 2025 (Sign up Deadline extended to May 30th!)
Join us for the Fahmidan 2025 Amsterdam Retreat – a unique literary getaway where creativity and culture converge in one of Europe's most inspiring cities. From July 27th to August 3rd, immerse yourself in workshops, excursions, and an enriching literary experience like no other! With three different packages ranging from Bare Bones to the Full Experience, we want to make this retreat accessible to all!
With talented international literary citizen facilitators A.R.Arthur, Cass Garison, Rashna Wadia, Yasmine Dashti & Elizabeth M Castillo!
Some Workshop Titles include: "Writing with Purpose, finding the extraordinary in the Mundane", Finding words in Far-flung Places: Craft on the Move", "Becoming a Global Literary Citizen: Writing beyond our Society", A Chapbook/Full Length Workshop and much more!
Sign up & Find out More here.
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If you’re looking for new collections to read, then checkout the Fahmidan Bookstore for E-Chapbooks galore + check out the launch of the Second Edition of About Devotion by Sarah Al Zuraiqi here.
April 2025 Reading (Press the links below on ‘Monthly Review’ to read):
Review 1- Team Fahmidan
Molar by Allison Thung read here.
Bio: Allison Thung is a Singaporean poet. She is the author of Reacquaint (kith books, 2024), Molar (kith books, 2024), and Things I can only say in poems about/to an unspecified 'you' (Hem Press, 2025). Her poetry has been published in ANMLY, ONE ART, Sixth Finch, Cease, Cows, Gone Lawn, Heavy Feather Review, fifth wheel press, Querencia Press, and elsewhere, and nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net, Best Microfiction, and Best Small Fictions. Allison is an Assistant Poetry Editor at ANMLY.
Review 2- Team Fahmidan
Brutal Companion by Ruben Quesada read here.
Bio: Ruben Quesada is an American poet and critic. He was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. He is the winner of the 2023 Barrow Street Editors Prize. In 2022, Quesada published an award-winning anthology, Latinx Poetics: Essays on the Art of Poetry, by University of New Mexico Press.
Editor Tunes- Melodies guiding the Editorial Process
Check out some of the music that our Editors have been listening to while editing.
Check out the list here.
Check out our friends over at the European Writers Salon
European Writers Salon is a new non-profit organisation set up to connect writers across Europe. You can also subscribe to their newsletter for future events including Brussels, London and Paris here.
Check out all their forthcoming events here.
We are open for Summer Issue 23 submissions until June 15th 2025:
We pay $25.
We have a guaranteed 25 day response time.
We accept Poetry, Fiction & Non-Fiction.
We accept simultaneous submissions.
We offer both reader & editorial feedback.
Submit to Fahmidan Journal here
We hope to read your writing this coming month!
Will you be submitting?
Warm Regards
Team Fahmidan
Diversity in Action
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