Ink Sweat & Tears is a UK based webzine which publishes and reviews poetry, prose, prose-poetry, word & image pieces and everything in between. Our tastes are eclectic and magpie-like and we aim to publish something new every day.

We try to keep waiting-time short, but because of increased submissions, the current waiting time between submission and publication is around twelve weeks.

If you have come here looking for more information on our ‘Uprising & Resistance’ Project in conjunction with Spread the Word and Black Beyond Data, please go here.

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Featured Poetry/Prose of the Day

Gordan Struić

Outside,
the city slides by,
blurred lines
of glass and rain.

Stephen Keeler

The days were huge and kind
and sometimes after school

we’d buy a bag of broken biscuits
for the long walk home

across the heavy heat of afternoon
on lucky days she wouldn’t take

the pennies offered up in supplication

Joseph Blythe

I swear I felt the swirly patterned paper
rip from the walls of my childhood bedroom.
It was the same stained cream shade as my skin –
pockmarked, cut and scabbed, dry and peeling…..

Denise Bundred

Shadowed boats bereft of sail
absorb the surge and slap
constrained by a blue-grey chink
of mooring chains.

Rahma O. Jimoh

A bird skirts across the fence
& I rush to the window
to behold its flapping wings—
It’s been ages
since I last saw a bird.

Previously featured

Opeyemi Oluwayomi

They are piercing knife between
the city, detaching the body from the head,
& squeezing the blood out of the flesh,
so there can be an end to what hasn’t begun.

read more

Heather Walker

Felicity stepped off the edge of the path and walked into the water. Shock hit her as she sank. The water was cold and slimy with green algae, but between her splashing she saw Jesus peddling the little boat towards her.

read more

Recent Prose

Stephanie Aspin on ‘Why Words Help’ for Mental Health Awareness Week

Writing is both a way of making life more liveable and of making ourselves more whole. Words have a being-ness: when we write poetry, we tap into a network of resonances.

Cheryl Snell

I am all hair, glittering with diamond-glass. A forehead streaked with blood, rubies and roses crisscrossing the tangerine flaps of a ripped collar.

Sarah Thorne

The darkening sky skids past at sixty miles an hour. My eyes are keeping a vigil over the dead fringes of tarmac either side of the road as I drive . . .

Arlene Jackson

Hello Tamara, it’s lovely to hear your voice stretching out across the Atlantic, from your eco pod of wellness into my quiet space, where things are not so well today. But it is today. New and fresh.

Recent Haiku

Chen-ou Liu on International Haiku Poetry Day

end-of-day catch
our wicker basket full
of salmon sunset

Deborah Karl-Brandt

With every book I sell, with every piece of clothing I give away . . .

Clare Bryden

how do I begin?

R.C. Thomas

The Universe dreamed I’d come to its restaurant. I needed to pass the time before my train home.

Anthony Lusardi

the highway asphalt. reeks of exhaust and burnt rubber. the cars and trucks go by. the sun boiling and you rotting.

News

Welcome Sofía Masondo, our New Editing Intern

Welcome Sofía Masondo, our New Editing Intern

Sofía Masondo is a poet and theatre-maker of Argentine heritage based in London. Her work often explores themes of connection and disconnection between people, place and culture, taking inspiration across different art forms and from an intercultural upbringing.

read more

Word & Image

J.I. Kleinberg

J.I. Kleinberg

Here,
the rain
collaged
The first
mud
allegory.
The
uncertain
fields
the
gravel

read more

Filmpoems

Featured Poetry/Prose of the Day

Gordan Struić

Outside,
the city slides by,
blurred lines
of glass and rain.

Stephen Keeler

The days were huge and kind
and sometimes after school

we’d buy a bag of broken biscuits
for the long walk home

across the heavy heat of afternoon
on lucky days she wouldn’t take

the pennies offered up in supplication

Joseph Blythe

I swear I felt the swirly patterned paper
rip from the walls of my childhood bedroom.
It was the same stained cream shade as my skin –
pockmarked, cut and scabbed, dry and peeling…..

Denise Bundred

Shadowed boats bereft of sail
absorb the surge and slap
constrained by a blue-grey chink
of mooring chains.

Rahma O. Jimoh

A bird skirts across the fence
& I rush to the window
to behold its flapping wings—
It’s been ages
since I last saw a bird.

News

Welcome Sofía Masondo, our New Editing Intern

Welcome Sofía Masondo, our New Editing Intern

Sofía Masondo is a poet and theatre-maker of Argentine heritage based in London. Her work often explores themes of connection and disconnection between people, place and culture, taking inspiration across different art forms and from an intercultural upbringing.

read more

Word & Image

J.I. Kleinberg

J.I. Kleinberg

Here,
the rain
collaged
The first
mud
allegory.
The
uncertain
fields
the
gravel

read more

Filmpoems

Previously featured

Opeyemi Oluwayomi

They are piercing knife between
the city, detaching the body from the head,
& squeezing the blood out of the flesh,
so there can be an end to what hasn’t begun.

read more

Heather Walker

Felicity stepped off the edge of the path and walked into the water. Shock hit her as she sank. The water was cold and slimy with green algae, but between her splashing she saw Jesus peddling the little boat towards her.

read more

Recent Prose

Stephanie Aspin on ‘Why Words Help’ for Mental Health Awareness Week

Writing is both a way of making life more liveable and of making ourselves more whole. Words have a being-ness: when we write poetry, we tap into a network of resonances.

Cheryl Snell

I am all hair, glittering with diamond-glass. A forehead streaked with blood, rubies and roses crisscrossing the tangerine flaps of a ripped collar.

Sarah Thorne

The darkening sky skids past at sixty miles an hour. My eyes are keeping a vigil over the dead fringes of tarmac either side of the road as I drive . . .

Arlene Jackson

Hello Tamara, it’s lovely to hear your voice stretching out across the Atlantic, from your eco pod of wellness into my quiet space, where things are not so well today. But it is today. New and fresh.

Recent Haiku

Chen-ou Liu on International Haiku Poetry Day

end-of-day catch
our wicker basket full
of salmon sunset

Deborah Karl-Brandt

With every book I sell, with every piece of clothing I give away . . .

Clare Bryden

how do I begin?

R.C. Thomas

The Universe dreamed I’d come to its restaurant. I needed to pass the time before my train home.

Anthony Lusardi

the highway asphalt. reeks of exhaust and burnt rubber. the cars and trucks go by. the sun boiling and you rotting.

Picks of the Month

Reviews