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
Previously featured
Mel Joy
a line of hanging hooks
bent us into the dining hall
where we ate like birds
Judith Taylor
He reads aloud about visiting the Underworld in dreams,
seeing his dead again. Through the big window behind him
there’s a flowerbed and some long grass
Recent Prose
Recent Haiku
News
Poetry from Gurmeet Kaur, UEA’s Birch Family Scholar 2025/2026
I kill lines of ant. Heat arrives
in the wrong season. It feels important
to know the names of birds under
the thrum of a flight corridor.
Word & Image
Filmpoems
Zakia Carpenter-Hall
It had been such a long time… I was surprised by how gently my mother made my hair, asking if she should split the rows, my locs beginning to intertwine. She gently, as if using a miniature rake of a Japanese garden attends to the grove of my hair – so softly that it barely registers as touch.
I couldn’t imagine that she was doing it right, what with the absence of pain and discomfort, but she did, ordering and reordering, twisting my roots so they wouldn’t come loose and fastening them next to each other with silver clips for added strength, so they could dry.
Featured Poetry/Prose of the Day
News
Poetry from Gurmeet Kaur, UEA’s Birch Family Scholar 2025/2026
I kill lines of ant. Heat arrives
in the wrong season. It feels important
to know the names of birds under
the thrum of a flight corridor.
Word & Image
Filmpoems
Zakia Carpenter-Hall
It had been such a long time… I was surprised by how gently my mother made my hair, asking if she should split the rows, my locs beginning to intertwine. She gently, as if using a miniature rake of a Japanese garden attends to the grove of my hair – so softly that it barely registers as touch.
I couldn’t imagine that she was doing it right, what with the absence of pain and discomfort, but she did, ordering and reordering, twisting my roots so they wouldn’t come loose and fastening them next to each other with silver clips for added strength, so they could dry.
Previously featured
Mel Joy
a line of hanging hooks
bent us into the dining hall
where we ate like birds
Judith Taylor
He reads aloud about visiting the Underworld in dreams,
seeing his dead again. Through the big window behind him
there’s a flowerbed and some long grass
Recent Prose
Recent Haiku
Picks of the Month
‘Buried’ by Tamara Salih is March 2026 Pick of the Month on IS&T. Read & Hear It Read Here!
‘It captures the silence and stillness of childhood snow and all it can mask and hide beautifully’
NB: (In above image, central photo of a snow tunnel/cave – looking up – is by Alexandros Giannakakis via unsplash.com.)
‘At the Barbers’ by Stephen Chappell is the IS&T Pick of the Month for February 2026. Read and Hear It Here!
‘succinct, modest, affecting portrait of a good but constrained life’
‘simple but believable and moving, without being sentimental’
‘Unexploded Bombs’ by Samantha Carr is the IS&T Pick of the Month for January 2026.
‘A very striking and thought provoking piece of work.’
‘I enjoyed how this reflected Plymouth’s landmarks (I’m from Plymouth) but also medical anxiety (which is a common theme in my life). Unsettling.’
Reviews
Sairah Ashan Reviews ‘Unsafe’ by Karen McCarthy Woolf
Her words are thoughtfully presented. Her lyrics are philosophically dense. Most pages make liberal use of white space, providing pause to digest.
Emma Lee In Praise Of… Jeremy Dixon’s ‘The Beat The Pulse The Wave’
‘a lyrical collection that can be read either by watching the sunlight dance on the waves or diving below the surface to more serious messages and topics beneath’
Sue Johns Reviews ‘Something in Nothing’ by Zoe Brooks
Zoe Brooks uses all of these devices and more to create a superbly, dark narrative in her new collection Something in Nothing. Brooks is an assured storyteller whose work is steeped in the oral tradition.