Rail Switch Poetry is a new journal for poetry videos. Accepted submissions will be published online, to the publication website and possibly to a publication youtube or vimeo channel. This is an open call for submissions to the second issue, release date TBA.

It is not necessary that you read the following, but it may give you some idea of what we are looking for:

A poetry video is, as we imagine it, a poem set to video or vice versa but really it can be anything that fits the title. Light hearted, heartfelt and/or innovative takes on poetry and film are encouraged, but work with qualities that we are not thinking of, that take us by surprise may be better still. The artistic goal of this project is to present work that is moving and thought provoking. The material goal is to create a platform for serious art that can be created by anyone. A poetry video need not be long (though it can be) and it need not be shot on expensive equipment (though it can be). If you are reading this and thinking that you only have a phone to film with, we would love to see your work. If you are an experienced filmmaker with access to sophisticated equipment and would like to try something different, we would love to see your work. If you have made many poetry videos before, we will be surprised but we would love to see your work.

We cannot promise any financial compensation at this time. We hope you will submit anyway.

Please include a bio and the text/transcript of the poem, as well as any stills from the video that we may use for promotional purposes.

You must either own the rights to all elements of the video (poem, audio, imagery), or have permission to use all elements, or the elements used must be in the public domain.

You may interpret the concept of "poetry videos" as you wish. All submission lengths are accepted and all submissions are free. Multiple submissions are allowed.

Event dates are subject to change.