Half Day Moon Journal welcomes work “that rings like morning on the ear” as Telémakhos says in The Odyssey (trans. R. Fitzgerald). In other words, work from poets who never step into the same Heraclitean river twice…
The nuts and bolts: The annual reading window is in May and June. Send up to ten previously unpublished poems not simultaneously submitted elsewhere in a DOC, DOCX, or PDF to halfdaymoonpressinfo@gmail.com . The subject line should read: “Submission” + the current year (e.g. Submission 2026). If submitting work for the first time, also include your poems in the body of the email. (If eccentric formatting is involved, screenshots can be attached as JPEG, JPG or PNG files.) For an idea of the range of work published, do become familiar with previous issues prior to sending your work. Note that contributors’ biography statements are not included in any issue, however colorful they may be (and many of HDMJ’s contributors are indeed extraordinarily colorful). The focus in HDMJ is on the poetry itself.
Response time: Allow up to three weeks for a response. Only acceptance messages will be sent. If an acceptance message is not received within three weeks of the date that work is submitted, this means that the work did not correspond to the overall feel of the issue. Whether or not work is accepted, it is hoped that you will send new writing in the next reading window.
Copyright and courtesies: Copyright reverts to the creator after publication. However, acceptance of material to the journal also includes giving its publisher the right to proudly showcase sample work from an issue in blog or social media posts. If work is republished elsewhere, the customary courtesy of citing Half Day Moon Journal as the first publisher of a work is expected.
Compensation: In lieu of contributor's compensation fees, tree saplings are planted in Anatolia following each issue release by arrangement with the progressive NGO TEMA, The Turkish Foundation for Combating Soil Erosion, for Reforestation and the Protection of Natural Habitats. According to studies, much of Anatolia, a cradle of agriculture and civilization, is at risk of desertification.
Artwork: Each HDMJ issue features the solicited work of a single artist. For the sake of layout congruity, visual poetry (Vispo) which overly competes with the featured artist’s work is usually declined. Note that HDMJ is not currently accepting unsolicited manuscripts or proposals for artwork. Please check back to this page, where all future calls for artwork submissions will be posted.
Proofreading: Prior to each issue’s release, a galley proof will be sent out to contributors (usually around midsummer). Once all corrections have been made, the digital edition will be released, shortly followed by the print edition. These are typically published in August, if not later in the year.
Editor: Joseph S. Aversano
Menlo Park, CA / Ankara, TR