Q&A: Sarah Coolidge on Calico’s latest Call for Submissions
This week, Calico opened a call for submissions of poems and short pieces of flash fiction on the topic of sex to be featured in its next collection. Sarah Coolidge, Senior Editor at Two Lines, was instrumental in launching the Calico series in 2020, and they’ve since published 13 collections ranging from Chinese speculative fiction and international ghost stories to the first collection of Swahili fiction in English translation and poetry by Afghan women. For insights into what they’re looking for in their current open call, read the interview below. Deadline to submit is August 2, 2026.
What are you looking for in this open call for submissions?
We’re looking to be surprised and delighted. Here in the US, we’re told that sex is hard to write about, that it’s cringy, that it’s better not to write about it at all. I think that’s because it’s hard to not fall into how you’ve been taught to think about it. Especially in poetry, we’re tired of seeing the same old things. So we’re challenging translators to surprise us with new perspectives, new forms, and new ways of talking about sex.
What usually makes a submission stand out to you?
If I trust a translator, then I will accompany them to strange places. But in order to trust a translator I have to feel that they’ve thought about their word choice, given care to the work, and taken the extra step beyond a word-for-word translation to really breathe life into a poem. A submission stands out to me when I stop evaluating it and start enjoying it as a reader. If I’m pulled out of it by an awkward choice, or I can feel the syntax of the other language still, then I start to mistrust. To clarify, there’s a difference between making a daring choice and an awkward choice. A phrase can be strange on purpose and that’s daring. But you have to first earn the reader’s trust.
In these horrific times I’d like to carve out a little space for pleasure, an opportunity to revel in the language of bodies, their lust, joy, and laughter.
What are you hoping readers will discover through the selected work?
I’m hoping to prove that people can and should write about sex. It’s not a cliche in and of itself, there are just cliche ways of talking about it. In these horrific times I’d like to carve out a little space for pleasure, an opportunity to revel in the language of bodies, their lust, joy, and laughter.
Any advice for translators submitting to the Calico series for the first time?
Make sure to check that rights are available and try to send a good selection of work. We’re asking for at least 8 pages. The more we have to read the better. We often go back to someone and say, hey, we liked these two poems but not the others, can you send us a few more like those? And that’s how we’ll get the right selection.
Submissions are open until August 2, 2026, for both Calico and Two Lines Press. See the guidelines and submit your work here(opens in a new tab).
Since 2020, Two Lines Press’s Calico series has featured queer Brazilian literature, Romanian poetry, and Japanese stories, among other collections. The forthcoming title Splendor: Trans Poets (September 2026) explores queer bodies and trans experiences through newly translated works from Argentina, Denmark, Korea, Norway, and Quebec. Find all previous Calico publications here(opens in a new tab).
