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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Buy Ink Sweat & Tears Publishing books and pamphlets here.

Featured Poetry/Prose of the Day

Colin Pink

not the kind you eat with
but useful to turn the soil
root out potatoes or carrots

Linda Ford

My Father Bought a Signal Box
dismantled it piece by piece
then sold the wood, as a job lot.

Ryan O’Neill

we hug and i act cool
as the american fridge ice
shattering on kitchen tiles

David Thompson

Scrolling through my inbox I hold down
the shift key, select all and mass delete
briefly feel the repose of the therapist’s couch.

Marcelle Newbold

Hope lies like the edge of a teaspoon, upward facing, a thickness
perhaps enough solidness to knife
through a banana or other soft fruit

Previously featured

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.

read more

Samuel A. Adeyemi

I can already hear the chorus of my tribe.
They want the ancient blade,

the guillotine that hovered
above my head like a halo of death.

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

Word & Image

S. Niroshini

S. Niroshini

IRATTAM: A THEORY OF RED   Irattam is a short excerpt from a longer practise-based work in progress mediating on...

read more

Filmpoems

Jessamine O’Connor

Jessamine O’Connor

Nerve Music

Sometimes I’m jittery
like this jittering
nervousness appears
as a tremor from somewhere
distant far away inside
and I’m on edge

read more

Featured Poetry/Prose of the Day

Colin Pink

not the kind you eat with
but useful to turn the soil
root out potatoes or carrots

Linda Ford

My Father Bought a Signal Box
dismantled it piece by piece
then sold the wood, as a job lot.

Ryan O’Neill

we hug and i act cool
as the american fridge ice
shattering on kitchen tiles

David Thompson

Scrolling through my inbox I hold down
the shift key, select all and mass delete
briefly feel the repose of the therapist’s couch.

Marcelle Newbold

Hope lies like the edge of a teaspoon, upward facing, a thickness
perhaps enough solidness to knife
through a banana or other soft fruit

News

Word & Image

S. Niroshini

S. Niroshini

IRATTAM: A THEORY OF RED   Irattam is a short excerpt from a longer practise-based work in progress mediating on...

read more

Filmpoems

Jessamine O’Connor

Jessamine O’Connor

Nerve Music

Sometimes I’m jittery
like this jittering
nervousness appears
as a tremor from somewhere
distant far away inside
and I’m on edge

read more

Previously featured

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.

read more

Samuel A. Adeyemi

I can already hear the chorus of my tribe.
They want the ancient blade,

the guillotine that hovered
above my head like a halo of death.

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