Concise Literature

Poems, Brief Nonfiction, Micro and Flash Fiction

We are on the brink of National Poetry Month, where I feel the draw to look at The American Poetry Review, an influential print journal featuring poems of any length. I’m also drawn to Brevity: A Journal of Concise Literary Nonfiction and Fractured Lit, two online journals for forms of lyrically compact, imaginative nonfiction and fiction.

The American Poetry Review (APR) has published over 6,000 writers since 1972, six issues per year, in its newsletter format, with interviews, book reviews, and essays, and the coveted back page poem spot. It’s mission is to serve a worldwide audience excellent contemporary poetry and literary criticism, to expand that audience, and provide poets with a far-reaching forum in which to present their work. Elizabeth Scanlon is their current editor-in-chief. They annually award the Stanley Kunitz Memorial Prize for a single poem by a poet under 40, as well two book prizes: APR/Honickman First Book Award, and more recently, Gerald Stern Prize for poets o…