March 2026 Challenge
Power
In theory, transparency and accountability protect the public. In practice, information is often shaped, cropped, obscured. Lies are presented as evidence without question. Powerful people are implicated in horrific crimes, and then show up to work the next day. What happens when redaction becomes a tool of power?
Write about cover-ups: governmental, institutional, personal. Send us your fiction, poems, and creative nonfiction about what gets hidden. About survivors whose names surface while abusers walk free. About secrecy as strategy, incompetence as weapon, and silence as intimidation. We’re seeking writing that interrogates erasure, exposure, and the dangerous space between truth and what we’re allowed to see. When the black marker moves across the page, who does it protect?
We welcome writing of all forms: fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry, and hybrid work. Erasure pieces are welcome, as long as the source text is under two pages. Please include the source material in your submission.
Three winners will be selected and published at the end of April.
Prizes:
March 1, 2026
up to 1,000 words of prose or 2 pages of poetry
$10