“Warrior,” which began in a @smokelong Summer 2025 is out! Thanks to everyone who helped.

Check out “Warrior,” a piece of flash fiction by newcomer Pam Avoedo on eggplant texts, urgent care, and why we can’t take care of ourselves at www.unlikelystories.org/content/warr... #fiction #smallpress #litmag

Karlo Sevilla is back with his poem, “Low-Intensity Grassfires, Early 1980s,” on standing witness, the rage of the betrayed, and the assumption of safety at unlikelystories.org/content/low-... #poetry #litmag #smallpress

I am shocked, I say. Absolutely shocked.

Just sayin'

This could get gooey.

Jeremy Nathan Marks is back, with three poems on fish behind glass, atonal lullabies, and praying over Walkerville Rye at unlikelystories.org/content/city... #poetry #litmag #smallpress

My take as a consumer and creator of filth: i don't want sex scenes to be stigmatized. I don't want them to be unusual. I want people to use art to explore every aspect of sexuality they find compelling, from asexuality to extreme kink. I want it all to exist. I don't trust people who say otherwise.

Check out “The McShane Dimension,” a one-scene play by newcomer Lance Mazmanian on objectively examining our failures as a species and the question of who owns Earth at unlikelystories.org/content/the-... #smallpress #litmag #theatre #theater

Always a great sign when your captors are writing numbers on your arms.

Meet newcomer Micah Zevin, who brings us three projective poems on spider ceilings, daily quizzes, and loving zero at www.unlikelystories.org/content/poss... #poetry #litmag #smallpress

OH MY GOD, IT'S A COVER DROP! Thanks so much to Bill Lavender of Lavender Ink / Diálogos for designing this wonderful cover for "A Limited Number of Miracles," my forthcoming book! It'll be out (relatively) soon, and will be almost as good as the cover!

Welcome back Linda K. Miller, who brings us two poems on the sunset’s moodiness, pinks, purples, phloxes, and puce, and depression as soulmate at unlikelystories.org/content/suns... #poetry #litmag #smallpress

Hello happy poets! Did you miss yesterday's episode of Lit Balm: An Interactive Livestream Reading Series? It's up on the YouTubes now at youtu.be/o2gHVtDvjHc

Ezra Klein and Gavin Newsome's strategy of appeasement is what leads to the far right. Folding on reproductive or trans rights to try and win elections normalizes those positions as moderate rather than extreme

Welcome back David E. Matthews, who brings his signature style of textovisual poetry with “One Night on Five at Live,” a tale of inmates, guards, and lawyers at unlikelystories.org/content/one-... #poetry #visualpoetry #textovisual #litmag #smallpress

Meet newcomer Luke D Evans, who brings us three poems of the ones death imagines, spiraling tachyonic plagues, and the formula of our survival at www.unlikelystories.org/content/narr... #poetry #litmag #smallpress

Are you a disabled, chronically ill, or neurodivergent writer with a recent or forthcoming book? If so, query us about our new book review and interview series. We'd love to celebrate your work!

Your local library is full of media that the president hates but can't use his regulatory power to get rid of.

Newcomer Matthew F. Amati brings us “The Book of the Dead Boy,” a series of interconnected vignettes about a smoky ghostlike Face, turning steel into wax, and the inside of the outside at unlikelystories.org/content/the-... #fiction #smallpress #litmag

Trying to focus on the code for Book IV of "Love Has Been Liquidated" by John Bryan but it's early and I'm bleary.

I cannot and will not cut my conscience to fit this year's fashion. - Lillian Hellman, blacklisted for not naming names to The House Committee on Un-American Activities (1952).

It's pretty clear that they got their Reichstag Fire with the Kirk assassination. Democracy is dead. We now have a fascist dictator.

We're 7 months in and Trump and the oligarchs have completely seized control of the media. If you criticize them, your show will be pulled from the air. This is what dictators do. Fascism isn't coming, it's here.

now is the time for every media personality to stand up and speak out, because what this shows is that nothing will save you they’re coming for all of you, unless you’re a true believer your days are numbered and your bosses are eager to comply do something you can be proud of on your way out

Every day on social media, I see ten posts exhorting me to write, but none encouraging me to read.

M. W. Miller is back, with another sprawling and dark set of poems, “Grand Views from the Sidewalks of North Avenue,” on fogging eyes and writing in bus depots at www.unlikelystories.org/content/gran... #poetry #smallpress #litmag

What would you do if you believed that poetry mattered?

this is so much worse than i could have even expected and i expected it to be horrifically racist and fucked up

Martha Zweig is back! Check out her three poems on risen flamingos, engineering organisms, and your April Fool’s paradise at unlikelystories.org/content/evic... #poetry #litmag #smallpress

Legacy media and cable news reduced Trump's aggression against Chicago to a question of whether troops would be sent immediately. When he said he was taking his fascist military spectacle elsewhere, those media players declared the situation over—while waves of federal agents attack our neighbors.

A friend of mine was on Charlie Kirk's "watch list" of Black professors. She received so many death and rape threats that her university offered her a security detail for the walk to class. This is Kirk's legacy. You would never know it from reading all of these legacy newspaper op-eds about him.

On the future of the Unlikely Stories archives: www.facebook.com/groups/unlik...

Check out A Sardine on Vacation, Episode 85, “Good and the Bad,” in which Pope Sixtus pens contemporary apologia for himself and the Catholic Church at unlikelystories.org/content/good... #litmag #smallpress

The reason for the anger at posting Kirk’s words is simply that we are entering a fascistic world where the truth is dangerous and lies become facts. It is literally how fascism sustains itself. Turning bigots into martyrs and innocent people into criminals. And that’s why saying the truth matters.

This is how they ensure political opponents can't escape when they start rounding them up. If you're in a position to leave, you should do so now before they close the door. theintercept.com/2025/09/13/m...

Invitation to friends in the arts. I'm part of a group organizing a project called Fall of Freedom. We want artists and orgs of all kinds (whether you're an Indie bookstore, a cinema, gallery, whatever) to come together to resist authoritarianism. Starting November 21st... www.falloffreedom.com

The Groyper Wars

I refuse to deplore "political violence" when it is made so explicit that it is the adjective, not the noun, that troubles the people so openly weeping and rending their garments right now. Either we all have a ticket in the Victim of Gun Violence Lotto or none of us do.

Unlikely co-conspirator Vincent A. Cellucci is back, with three poems on conceiving an orgy, manifest destiny, and sinking someplace new at unlikelystories.org/content/know... #poetry #litmag #smallpress

The oligarchs are consolidating all of the legacy media. This would leave David Ellison, son of Oracle founder Larry Ellison, in control of CBS News and CNN. On top of that, 2 major studios in Paramount and Warner Bros. This is a hostile takeover of the information space. www.wsj.com/business/med...

Welcome newcomer David Lawton, who brings us two poems on democratically elected leaders, their tin pot replacements, and clothing retailers without irony at unlikelystories.org/content/the-... #poetry #litmag #smallpress

My story TheTrog Girl is out in @unlikely-stories.bsky.social. Immigration comes in waves, and each wave introduces challenges to the descendants of earlier waves. The story plays some of these out between two girls living a floor apart in San Francisco’ Excelsior District. www.unlikelystories.org

Meet newcomer Michael Thériault ( @mtheriaultsf.bsky.social ), who brings his short story “The Trog Girl” on racism, assimilation, and what happens to Mixteco kids at the drug store at www.unlikelystories.org/content/the-... #fiction #smallpress #litmag

Having a sense of meaning, identity, and belonging matter on the deepest psychological level. The less a free society offers these, the more likely it is to fall to fascism. Because ultimately many people will chase them even if it means letting go of freedom.

Welcome back Karol Nielsen, who brings her poem “Chere” on hip idols, St. Mark’s Place, and how to handle failure at www.unlikelystories.org/content/chere #poetry #litmag #smallpress

It's coming up fast! Hope to see you there! www.facebook.com/events/79493...