Two Weeks Left to Submit!

By 4/30, send us your very best poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, and artwork alongside two earlier drafts!

Apr 17, 2026

On Digging Up Drafts

Are you seven (or seventeen) drafts deep into your latest poem, fiction story, CNF essay, or art piece? Does your writing folder contain a V2, V3, V4 and beyond of something you’ve been working to make just right?

If you’re a creator who loves process, here’s our invitation: Go dig through your notes app or old files for that first version of your shining, polished piece; excavate your Google Docs; transcribe your scribbled journal entries! Find the lightning moments when the work was born, the gorgeous, gangly, growing-pain drafts, and submit them to Copytext Magazine alongside your best and final work.

At Copytext, we want the honor of reading your very best work and your messy early drafts.

It’s an invitation to self-curate your own context—the story of how your art came into the world.

To think of your drafts as evidence and autobiography—a slice of a personal archive worth preserving.

To share the hard work behind the Work—the ways it evolved and evolved and evolved.

1. Want a Template? We Got You.

Submitting creative work for publication shouldn’t be a chore. You’ve already done the hard part: written, sketched, revised, rewritten, then revised again until your work sings.

We’ve created a handy-dandy template for submissions. Just download and follow the guidelines for a quick and formatted Copytext submission packet.

2. Submit Via Our New Submittable Portal

Once you have your Final, Middle, and Early draft(s) ready to go, submit your packet to your genre category on our Submittable portal.

In the cover letter box, include the title(s) of your pieces, a brief 3rd-person bio, and any salient details or crucial context. Keep it short, but feel free to show some personality—we value the person behind the work!