- Carmen et Error

an illustration of a skull. The skull is upside down and missing its jawbone. From the cranium, a few sprouting leaves grow.

The cause of Roman poet Ovid’s exile was “carmen et error”, a poem and a mistake. We want your poems and your mistakes. Fiction that falls between genres. Weird, wild poems. Anything speculative, daring, or just plain odd. Carmen et Error is a micro-journal/newsletter that features three-four pieces of exceptional work each quarter.

Which is to say we accept poems up to 40 lines long, and microfiction/oddities up to 350 words. We reserve a couple of spaces for writers who are from or have a significant connection to the North of England. Please read our full guidelines before submitting!

We’re looking for great work, although we don’t mind if it’s a little rough around the edges (we’ll forgive an error or two)! If you want to get a feel for what we like, take a look at our past issues.

We nominate work we publish for prizes where we can, including Best of the Net, Best Small Fictions and the Pushcart Prize.

Please subscribe to get issues of Carmen straight to your inbox! As well as submissions opportunities and news from our sister project, The Braag. Our updates are both infrequent and interesting.

Carmen et Error is run by The Braag, a community interest company that supports underrepresented writers in the North East of England, check out our other projects including our pamphlet press, workshops and events here.