Save the Date! We’re Back! In-Person Party

After three years of celebrating untethered, and our talented contributors, online – WE’RE BACK and throwing an IN-PERSON Re-Launch Party and Fundraiser! 

It has been so long since we have been able to connect with our contributors and readers face-to-face and we absolutely CANNOT wait to gather with you all, our fantastic community, to listen and share beautiful words together. 

We really hope you will join us.  

YOU’RE INVITED – SAVE THE DATE

The ReLaunch event will be held at one of our all-time favourite venues, The Supermarket (268 Augusta Ave, Toronto) on the evening of Wednesday, June 15th from 7-10 PM. You can find the Facebook event page here to stay up to date with all the new info.

The evening will include readings from contributors across TWELVE ISSUES and EIGHT YEARS of untethered, (where has the time gone?!) followed by an hour-long open mic where anyone is invited to sign up and share their stuff. 

Reader Line-Up: The roster of readers is still growing as I type this but you can expect to hear new and archived work from some of your favourite past untethered contributors including…

Josh Edgar, Carol Harvey Stetski, Khashayar Mohammadi, Diana Manole, Karen Mulhallen, Christine Tran, Michael Russell, Trevor Abes, Fran Westwood, Lana Crossman, Guy Elston, Ellen Chang-Richardson, André Babyn, Vannessa Barnier, Rasiqra Revulva, Wren Jones Jason Paradiso, Andrew Simpson and MORE! 

Featured readers have not been asked to read pieces that appear in untethered, but rather simply any piece they’ve been itching to read upon a stage. We’re so excited to hear what they choose!

We will, of course, also be holding our coveted raffle draw!! This year we’re doing something a bit different. We have a raffle prize line-up just dripping with the full-length volumes, chapbooks, and collections from some of our hottest past contributors, including: 

Raffle tickets will be sold before the readings begin as well as during the break but prizes will be drawn all night so scoop ‘em quick!

We will be accepting PWYC donations at the door and selling our three pandemic-launched issues (including our Poetry Special Issue, hot off the press!) at a sweet, sweet discount as well as the rest of our available back issues. 

We will also be holding a book sale of literary journal back issues that Steph has been hoarding away over the years. Pick up multiple years-worth of your favourite journals like Room, Fiddlehead, Tin House, Grain, Taddle Creek, PRISM, Qwerty, and other small mag gems! Single Issues for $3! Three Books for $5! Five Books for $10. 

We really hope you will join us for what will be an EPIC night of literary delights!

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untethered In-Person ReLaunch

Reader Profiles: Vol.12 Virtual Launch Party

Meet the featured readers who will be gracing our virtual stage at the Vol. 12 Poetry Special Issue Launch Party!

Don’t forget — We launch THIS WEEK on Wednesday, June 8th, 2022 @ 7 – 8 30 PM EST on Zoom. If you haven’t already registered for the launch, register here!

Visit the Virutal Launch Hub for all other launch related info including how you can win some amazing raffle prizes!

Christine Wu is a Chinese-Canadian poet whose work has appeared in various publications including The Fiddlehead, The Malahat Review and Contemporary Verse 2. Originally from the West Coast, she now makes her home in Kjipuktuk/Halifax, Nova Scotia, where she is working on a full-length poetry collection.

Guy Elston is a British language teacher and poet who lives in Toronto. His poetry has been included by The Moth, Anthropocene, Ink Sweat & Tears, The Honest Ulsterman and other journals on both sides of the Atlantic. Twitter: @guy_elston.

Sheri Doyle (she/her) is a poet, writer and editor who has worked in the publishing industry for the last two decades. Her work has appeared in magazines, newspapers and book format through both trade and educational publishers. Sheri’s poems have appeared most recently in The Antigonish Review and the Rhapsody anthology. Her first chapbook is forthcoming with Vocamus Press.

Dawn Steiner began writing poetry under the guidance of Stephanie Bolster. She has collaborated on five chapbooks as well as a collection in book form called Oblique Strokes. She was the winner of Arc’s Diane Brebner Prize in 2019. Her poems have appeared in Bywords, In/Words, Feral, Prairie Fire and in the anthology Heartbeat.

Wren Jones is a writer and outdoor enthusiast, likely walking the ravines of Toronto right now. She obtained her BA and B.Ed from York University and is now studying writing at Simon Fraser University. Her young adult novel, The Real Dealio, was a finalist in the 2021 CANSCAIP National Writing for Children contest. Several of her pieces are published or forthcoming in The Embrace of Dawn, PS I Love You and Drunk Monkeys.

T. Best (‘tam-ra’/she/they) is a graduate of the Community Worker program at George Brown College and a former student of SEED Alternative in Toronto and the Integrated Arts program in Peterborough. Queer by nature and a performer by habit, Tamara enjoys wondering and wandering past historic places in rural Ontario. You can watch more of Tamara’s poetry in two videos produced by Shatterbox Theatre or read it in the Waterwheel Review, Sparked Literary Magazine, NonBinary Review, Queer Toronto Literary Magazine and a forthcoming anthology with Caitlin Press.

McKenna James Boeckner (they/them) is a writer serotinously transplanted from Thunder Bay, Ontario. They are pursuing a PhD in Creative Writing from the University of New Brunswick on the traditional unceded territory of the Wolastoqiyik people. Their most recent play, Skylark Song, is scheduled as the mainstage production of Halifax’s OutFest in May of 2022. Follow and find more at memoirsofasodomite.com.

Toast Wong is an activist, engineer and butch idiot living in Toronto, Ontario. Growing up on the Credit River, she writes about diaspora and gender, divorce and science with a lack of regard for her physical integrity. Sometimes, late at night, you can see her drive like an asshole in the west end.

Michael Russell (he/they) is the author of chapbook Grindr Opera (Frog Hollow Press). He’s queer, has BPD, Bipolar Disorder, and way too much anxiety. His work has appeared in Contemporary Verse 2, Heavy Feather Review and SICK Magazine among other places. He lives in Toronto and thinks you’re fantabulous. Instagram: @michael.russell.poet.

Kayleigh Cline has been previously published in Grain, FreeFall and Understorey. Her work has also appeared on a bus and on a beer: her contribution to the Edmonton Poetry Festival’s “Poetry Route” contest was displayed on a bus and her contribution to Jason Lee Norman’s “Summer Sessions” project with Blindman Brewing and CKUA Radio was displayed on a beer. An active member of the Stroll of Poets Society and the Canty Collective of Writerly Women, she lives in Edmonton, Alberta.

Lauren Prousky is a Kitchener-based play and research-based artist, writer and curator working primarily in sculpture, fibres and zines. Lauren’s work spans a variety of topics and generally consists of a fluctuating rotation of three to five projects. These currently include the aesthetics and linguistics of cultural Judaism, sudoku puzzles as a type of generative art, and slime as a cultural phenomenon.

Tea Gerbeza (she/her) is a disabled and neurodivergent queer poet, writer and multimediaartist creating in Treaty 4 territory (Regina, Saskatchewan). Tea holds an MFA in Writing from the University of Saskatchewan and an MA in English and Creative Writing from the University of Regina. Tea’s most recent work appears or is forthcoming in Literary Review of Canada, Contemporary Verse 2, Release All the Words Stuck Inside You III and Room. Her two corgis, Tonks and Ghost, bark their reminders to have a snack and keep her feet warm as she writes. Find out more on teagerbeza.com.

Jill Michelle teaches at Valencia College in Orlando, Florida. Her latest poems appear, or are forthcoming, in DMQ Review, Please See Me, Delmarva Review, Coffee People and Drunk Monkeys. Recent anthology credits include The Book of Bad Betties (Bad Betty Press, United Kingdom) and Words from the Brink (Arachne Press Limited, United Kingdom). To check out more of her work, visit byjillmichelle.com.

Vera Hadzic (she/her) is a writer from Ottawa, Ontario and is currently studying English and history at the University of Ottawa. Recently, her work has appeared in Minola Review, Hexagon Magazine, Idle Ink, Okay Donkey Magazine and elsewhere. She can be found on Twitter @HadzicVera or through her website, www.verahadzic.com.

Andrea Margaret Martineau is a poet, bibliophile and phytomaniac with a penchant for heritage buildings and their paranormal tenants. She left her hometown of Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan to complete her BA in English at the University of Regina. She now resides in the Queen City with her family, rescue cats, Horsfield tortoise and collection of houseplants. Her poetry has previously been published in BlankSpaces, [SPACE], Figroot Press and Freshwater Literary Journal.

Lana Crossman grew up in rural New Brunswick and now lives in Ottawa, Ontario. Her debut chapbook, Buoyant, at last, will be published by Rose Garden Press in fall 2022. Lana’s poetry has been published in FEED, FERAL, flo., The Light Ekphrastic, Bywords, G U E S T and Apt613. She won Carleton University’s Lilian I. Found Award for Poetry in 2020 and was on the shortlist for the John Newlove Poetry Award in 2018.

Pauline Peters is an African-Canadian writer living in Toronto, the territory of Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishnabeg, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee and the Wendat peoples. She has been published in Canadian Literature, The Antigonish Review, Room, The Fiddlehead, The Windsor Review, The Nashwaak Review, The Literary Review of Canada and Blank Spaces. She was short-listed for the Gwendolyn MacEwen Poetry Competition sponsored by Exile Quarterly and her chapbook The Salted Woman was published last year by the British publisher Hedgespoken Press.

Kate Marshall Flaherty was shortlisted for the Mitchell Poetry Prize 2021, Arc’s Poem of the Year 2019 and the Gwendolyn MacEwen Poetry Prize 2018. She has published five books of poetry and has been published in numerous Canadian and international journals such as Contemporary Verse 2, Vallum, Grain, Room, Trinity Review, The Literary Review of Canada and American Academy of Poets. She writes spontaneous “Poems Of the Extraordinary Moment” (P.O.E.M.s) for charity, in person and online, and guides StillPoint Writing and Poetry Editing Circles online. See her performance poetry online at https://katemarshallflaherty.ca.   

Vol. 12 Poetry Special Issue Launch Hub

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Vol. 12 Poetry Special Issue Launch Party!

Welcome to the untethered vol. 12 Poetry Special Issue Virtual Launch Hub, the one stop shop for everything launch related!

Our brand new issue, Vol. 12, will be launched virtually on Zoom (link for registration here) on Wednesday, June 8th @ 7PM EST. RSVP to the event on Facebook to stay up to date!

When: Wednesday, June 8th@ 7PM EST.

Where: virtually on Zoom (link to register). Click here to RSVP to the Facebook event page!

Featured Readers

We’ve got an incredible reader line-up for you this launch!

Featuring readings from Christine Wu, Kayleigh Cline, Vera Hadzic, Wren Jones, Lauren Prousky, Michael Russell, Jill Michelle, T. Best, Lana Crossman, Toast Wong, Kate Marshall Flaherty, McKenna James Boeckner, Sheri Doyle, Andrea Margaret Martineau, Guy Elston, Tea Gerbeza, Dawn Steiner, and Pauline Peters!

Raffle Prizes

Enter the untethered launch raffle now for your chance to win some amazing prizes! This year we’re doing things a little differently and raffling off some of the full-length volumes from past contributors including

Grab Your Tickets Here!

Grab Your Copy of the New Issue

Vol. 12 On Sale For $15

This Poetry Special Issue includes new work from Khaloud Al-Muttalibi, T.  Best, McKenna James Boeckner, Kayleigh Cline, Lana Crossman, Sheri Doyle, Guy Elston, Rosa Fernandez, Kate Marshall Flaherty, Tea Gerbeza, Vera Hadzic, Wren Jones, Taidgh Lynch, S. Mahamud, Andrea Margaret Martineau, Jill Michelle, Pauline Peters, Lauren Prousky, Michael Russell, Dawn Steiner, Matthew Walsh, Fran Westwood, Toast Wong and Christine Wu.

Cover Art by Maia Stark

Grab Your Copy Here

Raffle Tickets

Grab your raffle tickets for your chance to win some amazing prizes!

1 Ticket for $2

3 Tickets for $5

Arms length of Tickets (15 tickets!!) for $10 (*BEST DEAL*)

Grab Your Tickets Here!

Grab Back Issues at Special Launch Prices!

Any available back issue for ONLY $8 (shipping within Canada included)

Get Your Back Issues Here!

Having a hard time deciding? Check out our back issue excerpts pages here!

Support untethered

We are an independent literary magazine and receive no external funding. We only exist because of the amazing support we receive from incredible readers like you!

Selling issues and raffle tickets at our live launches was the way we made back the majority of our funds to print future issues.

We know the pandemic has hit us all hard, and we are not exempt. All donations of any amount are greatly appreciate and help us keep doing what we’re doing!

Donate to untethered

Don’t Fret!

While we encourage everyone to gather virtually and celebrate the launch of this issue at the live event, we understand that life is pretty unpredictable right now. If you can’t attend the live launch you will be able to access the video on YouTube and Facebook even after the event has ended.

We can’t wait for you to join us!

View Your Shopping Cart

Submissions Closed

Thank you to everyone who submitted their work for consideration in vol.13!

We are so excited to read your work!

If your work is accepted, you will hear from us by July 2022.

Due to the incredible volume of submissions we receive, we are unable to contact those who haven’t been chosen for inclusion.

Thank you for your patience while we review submissions.

Vol. 12 Poetry Special Issue Virtual Launch

Hello lovely humans!

Vol. 12, Poetry Special Issue is HOT OFF THE PRESS and we are excited to announce we will be holding a virtual launch via Zoom to celebrate all the incredible contributors included in this new little gem of a volume.

The launch, taking place on Wednesday, June 8th 7 – 9PM EST will feature live and pre-recorded readings from over twelve Vol. 12 contributors and as always we will be holding our coveted raffle draw, but this time with a twist. Instead of raffling subscriptions and back issues to our fellow lit mags, we are raffling off some very generously donated full-length volumes from past contributors.

Head on over to the Vol. 12 Launch Hub here to check out all that we have planned for you and put us in your calendar now! Really. Right now. Do it. You don’t want to miss this event!

You must register for the event in order to attend. You can do so here.

Vol. 12 is currently on sale for a sweet, sweet discount (ONLY $15!) if you buy your copy before June 1st. Click here to grab yours today! It’s just so darn beautiful!

We also have some super exciting news to share re: in-person events!

We’re BACK BABY! We’ll be hosting an IN-PERSON celebration of all things untethered on Wednesday, June 15th (one week after the virtual event) at The Supermarket Bar (Augusta Ave, Toronto) from 7-10 PM. The event will include readings from contributors spanning all twelve of our past issues and EIGHT years of untethered, sales on all of our pandemic-produced issues AND an hour-long open mic after the scheduled readings finished. We are just finalizing some last details before we share the event but put THAT in your calendar too!

We can’t wait to celebrate with you!

Vol. 12 Cover Reveal!

VOL. 12 COVER REVEAL!

Cover art by Maia Stark

Vol. 12 features poems by Khaloud Al-Muttalibi, T. Best, McKenna James Boeckner, Kayleigh Cline, Lana Crossman, Sheri Doyle, Guy Elston, Rosa Fernandez, Kate Marshall Flaherty, Tea Gerbeza, Vera Hadzic, Wren Jones, Taidgh Lynch, S. Mahamud, Andrea Margaret Martineau, Jill Michelle, Pauline Peters, Lauren Prousky, Michael Russell, Dawn Steiner, Matthew Walsh, Fran Westwood, Toast Wong, and Christine Wu.

Order your copy of our limited print run, poetry special issue today! What are you waiting for? 

Stay tuned for details for the vol. 12 online launch!

DEADLINE EXTENDED for themed issue

untethered’s very first themed submission call wants your HELP-inspired manifestations.

Submissions of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, visual artwork and those strange beings in-between that explore the theme of HELP are welcomed from April 1 – May 15th.

We recently updated our submission guidelines. Please read them over here before you submit.

We can’t wait to read your work!

Vol. 12 Contributor Spotlight: Christine Wu

Meet Christine Wu! Christine’s poems, “At the Friendship Store,” “How to Speak Home,” and “Before Putting in an Offer on that Old House,” will be featured in our upcoming poetry special issue, vol. 12.

How Christine describes “Before Putting an Offer in on That Old House” in 12 words or less:
“When house hunting becomes a grief exercise”

How Christine describes “How to Speak Home” in 12 words or less:
“Locating what gets lost in translation”

How Christine describes “At the Friendship Store” in 12 words or less:
“How to navigate the past by visiting a familiar, unfamiliar place”

Christine Wu is a Chinese-Canadian poet whose work has appeared in various publications including The Fiddlehead, The Malahat Review and Contemporary Verse 2. Originally from the West Coast, she now makes her home in Kjipuktuk/Halifax, Nova Scotia, where she is working on a full-length poetry collection.

 

Pre-order your copy of our limited run poetry special issue now!
 
Don’t forget! Submissions for our next issue, themed “Help,” are open until May 1st.

Vol. 12 Contributor Spotlight: Toast Wong

Meet Toast Wong! Toast’s poems, “triptych to the dynamics of failure, 2nd ed.” and “for ml”, will be featured in our upcoming poetry special issue, vol. 12.

How Toast describes these poems in 12 words or less:
“two eulogies: for a friend and a future”

Toast Wong is an activist, engineer and butch idiot living in Toronto, Ontario. Growing up on the Credit River, she writes about diaspora and gender, divorce and science with a lack of regard for her physical integrity. Sometimes, late at night, you can see her drive like an asshole in the west end.

 

Pre-order your copy of our limited run poetry special issue now!
 
Don’t forget! Submissions for our next issue, themed “Help,” are open until May 1st.