The Writers Alliance of Gainesville (WAG) published its 15th annual “Bacopa Literary Review” last week with local and international submissions creating a unique combination of formal poetry, free verse poetry, visual poetry, flash fiction and creative nonfiction. 

Editor in Chief J.N. Fishhawk said this year’s edition contains fewer local writers than in the past, but since the editors judge submissions blind, each edition has a different composition. 

“We got fantastic submissions, and we’re really excited about the journal that we put together,” Fishhawk said. “We think it’s a lot of good quality work, really interesting stuff—some of it very timely and engaging and some of it timeless, good for escaping the grind of the moment into the world of literature.” 

WAG volunteers compile the entire publication, and Fishhawk said he’s lucky to have great editors over each category to sift through thousands of submissions. In total, he said it takes hundreds of hours to put it all together. The alliance also contracts the design portion of the journal.  

The editors of poetry, fiction and creative nonfiction select the top works to make it into Bacopa and also lay out an order that flows from one piece to the next. Fishhawk and Managing Editor T. Walters try to stay faithful to that order while splicing pieces from different genres in order to vary the lengths throughout the journal.  

“It’s our gift to the local community and to our fellow members of the Writers Alliance of Gainesville and to the world,” Fishhawk said. “We feel like every literary publication is an opportunity for a writer’s work to make it out into the world and be seen.”    

Each year, Fishhawk said themes tend to emerge from the submissions. In 2021, editors noticed birds as a common motif.  

Fishhawk said pieces this year seemed to deal with liminal spaces and shifting borders—places where aspects of life, nature and human society mix. Where opposites mix and become blended. 

“Though we spend whole calendars’ worth of time and gallons of ink writing out all the ways in which the liminal, the commingled, the unclear edges of reality confuse and scare us, life demands that we face those boundaries,” Fishhawk writes in the forward of the 2024 Bacopa.  

WAG will hold a reading event Sunday from 2:30 p.m. to 4 p.m. at the Millhopper Branch of the Alachua County Library District (3145 NW 43rd St., Gainesville). Bacopa editors will read all or portions of winning submissions, and some local writers who earned a place in the journal will also read their pieces.  

Another local component of the journal is the cover. For the past several years, Fishhawk said Bacopa reaches out to “dual threat” artists who both write and create visual art. The artist sends options for review, and the editorial team picks one.  

Ian Jackson, a UF student from Tampa, created this year’s cover titled “cyanotype number 23.” 

Fishhawk encourages Florida writers or visual artists to submit to Bacopa. While local submissions get no extra weight, he said WAG and the editors enjoy publishing and highlighting these submissions that make the cut.  

Bacopa hasn’t yet announced the categories for 2025 or the timeframe for submissions—March 4 through May 2 this year. But Fishhawk said those details will come before long on the journal’s Facebook page and the WAG website.  

Bacopa’s 2024 Winners and Honorable Mentions 

• Flash Fiction
  • Award: “Cowgirl’s Calling” by Cameron Edrich
  • Mention: “Revolver Rita First Look” by Mandira Pattnaik
• Creative NonFiction
  • Award: “Reenchanted” by Angela Townsend
  • Mention: “Bones Within and Without: An Ode to the Wild Dead” by Marisca Pichette
• Formal Poetry
  • Award: “Nothing Else Matters” by Sherre Vernon
  • Mention: “Let Your Shadows Lengthen on the Sundials” by Andrew Alexander Mobbs
• Free Verse Poetry
  • Award: “Things that Remind Me of Birds” by Desiree Remick
  • Mention: “Sunrise in Future Goma without Roaming Bullets” by Eniola Arowolo
• Visual Poetry
  • Award: “The Liberator” by Rebecca Loggia
  • Mention: “The Breakup” by C. Maris Bounds

For short biographies of the winners and honorable mentions, you can visit the Bacopa website. The website also contains winners and interviews from past years. The journal is available for purchase from Amazon. 

Bacopa’s team consists of Editor in Chief J.N. Fishhawk, Managing Editor T. Walters, Fiction Editor Alec Kissoondyal, Creative Nonfiction Editor Stephanie Seguin, Poetry Co-Editor Oliver Keyhani, Poetry Co-Editor J. Nishida, Editor Emerita Mary Bast and Social Media Manager Mary Ansell.