Call for Submissions – The Soliloquist Winter 2026 Issue 
Theme: Beneath the Surface 

Winter is a season of stillness—but beneath the frost, roots are reaching, rivers are flowing, and stories are gathering strength.  

For our Winter 2026 issue, The Soliloquist invites poets and writers to explore what lies hidden: the unspoken truths, buried memories, secret longings, submerged identities, and quiet rebellions that shape who we are. We seek work that dives below the obvious, the curated, the polished—into the depths where vulnerability, resilience, and revelation intertwine.  

Whether through stark confession, lyrical excavation, or mythic metaphor, show us what emerges when you peel back the layers.  

Subthemes:  

Hidden Geographies – Emotional or physical landscapes kept out of sight: attics, archives, borderlands, inner cities of the self.

Unvoiced Histories – Family secrets, erased narratives, silenced voices, and stories waiting to be reclaimed.  

Interior Weather – The emotional climates we carry: grief that mimics snowfall, joy that thaws from within, storms no one else can see.  

Masks and Mirrors – Performances of identity, the selves we show versus the ones we protect, and the moment the mask slips.  

Submerged Rituals– Private acts of devotion, coping, or remembrance that sustain us in silence.  

Beneath the Ice – What survives—and thrives—in emotional or societal winter?  

Whispers in the Archive – Letters never sent, diaries half-burned, digital footprints, and other traces of lives lived quietly.  

The Language of Shadows – How do we name what we’ve been taught to hide? Invent new syntax for the unspeakable.  

Second Skins– Transformations that happen not in spectacle, but in solitude: healing, unbecoming, rebirth.  

Echo Chambers & Open Fields – The tension between isolation and connection when your truth feels too dangerous or too tender to share.  

---

 Submission Guidelines:  

- Send up to 5 original, unpublished poems (no more than 40 lines each).  
- Include a brief bio in third person (50–70 words).  
- Email submissions to:  thesoliloquistmag@gmail.com 
- Subject line: “Winter 2026 Submission – [Your Name]” 

Submission Deadline:  January 20, 2026  
Publication Date:January 25, 2026  

The Soliloquist believes the most powerful voices often speak from the margins, the depths, the quiet corners. Don’t just tell us what’s on the surface—take us under.  

We’re listening.