Submit Work

Cicada challenges our talented and creative readers to answer the Call for Creative Endeavors. For the current theme and rules, cast your wondering eyes below. The Arbiters of Creative Endeavors will choose a few selections to run in upcoming issues of Cicada. Fame if not fortune is at your fingertips!

Your poem, photo, or artwork should reflect the theme of the current Call for Creative Endeavors below. If your work focuses on another topic, please check out The Slam or General Submissions. 

This Challenge theme will remain in effect through October 31 with selected poems and artwork to appear in the January/February 2011 issue of Cicada®.

YOUR CHALLENGE THEME: CATHARSIS

CATHARSIS: sweet release, breaking through the roadblock

"for i'm going to take a page / out of your book / make you my leon trotsky / and erase you from my history" from "Ode to a Past Comrade" (page 11)

"And then, then it's staring me in the face, the real thing I have to say. The real hurt I want the waves to erase." from "Prudent Paisley Gives Her Troubles Away" (page 20)

"The Marquis pushed back his hat, and leaned jauntily against some high-piled sacks of beans. His cheeks were flushed, and his eyes were shining." from "The Marquis and Miss Sally" (page 33)

Send us an original piece of artwork, photo, or poem on the topic CATHARSIS, and if we publish your submission in Cicada, you will receive two complimentary copies of the issue to share with admiring family and friends. Your theme-related artwork will be (1) any amalgamation of black, white, and/or gray, (2) any style or medium, and (3) up to 8½ x 11 inches in size. Photos can be black-and-white or color, and poems 30 lines or less.

Send your Creative Endeavors online by using the form below. Any work received digitally will not be returned.

Optionally, you may mail your submissions to:

For artwork/photos:
Cicada Arbiter of Creative Endeavors
70 E. Lake Street
Suite 300
Chicago, IL 60601
Note: If you mail artwork, please send original art/photo or a digital file of the scanned work at 300 dpi. Any non-digital artwork received through the mail and accompanied by a self-addressed, stamped envelope will be returned.

For poems:
Cicada Arbiter of Creative Endeavors
P.O. Box 300
Peru, IL 61354

Online Submission Form: