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Lowlife Lit Press carves out a niche in the literary world by embracing the unpolished, the downtrodden, and the defiantly real. It’s a press for those who’ve been knocked down but keep telling their stories anyway.
Lowlife Submissions


Catalyst to the Gutter: The Universe was in her Head
Excerpt from Chapter 12, Like Free Spirits, Unpublished Novel Story scratched her head, hoping she didn’t have lice again, her chewed-up...

Tracy Haught
2 days ago


Sold!
All I could think to do was cause a scene. By the time I ran in, only two bidders were left fighting it out over my granddaddy Ned’s...

Larry D. Thacker
1 day ago


Mirror
She was looking in the mirror. At first, I thought the slight woman with the matted, auburn hair pulled into a haphazard ponytail was...

Yvette Schnoeker-Shorb
1 day ago


Distorted Reflections
We plastered the walls with poetry and passion. I tore the heart from my sleeve; hammered home a tenpenny nail to hang it on. You ,...

Janice Mathis
2 days ago


She's Already Here
Eggs churning legs burning, a nonstop race to futility and constant pressure. I'm being watched as I whisk and now she wants to know...

Justin Edse
2 days ago


Catalyst to the Gutter: The Universe was in her Head
Excerpt from Chapter 12, Like Free Spirits, Unpublished Novel Story scratched her head, hoping she didn’t have lice again, her chewed-up...

Tracy Haught
2 days ago


Sacred Mountain: The Rugged Journey Within
I walk through the hillside, a hiking bag heavy with first aid, my shoes dust-covered, and my body shivering with cold. I try to run. I...

Yucheng Tao
3 days ago


Ripples Across Time
Klausenburg, Somewhere in the Balkans October 1912, beginning of conflict ON THE EVE OF THE WAR, our circle had called an emergency...

Lepidus Prunus
3 days ago


Why Must The Human Race Be Cursed This Way?
he left the cafe looking up at a sky that was about to spit at him Wouldn’t be the first calamity of today. In fact, he felt like...

Bogdan Dragos
3 days ago


Coming Home From The Front To Find Truth In A Tree
Them Oh, for war’s sweet end. To be grounded in home, to fall on my knees with you under our tree. Freed from the smells of gore—I...

Yvonne Osborne
3 days ago


Anthropophobia
it darkens the mind and dulls the senses, but you tell yourself you need it, like a pathetic junky afraid of living. you look out, into...

Ryan Fiennes
3 days ago


Bartender’s Observations
She used to linger a few tables away, close enough to hear their stories and smell the mildew in their boots. After they collected their...

Joe Couture
3 days ago


Ultimate Justice
A light snow was falling as Charlie Reardon left the diner and made his way down Madison Street. His thin boots crunched on the...

Alice A Baburek
3 days ago


Bourbon is Still My Drug of Choice
I drink to paradise and death, and the lie of love. Charles Bukowski I wander through the liquor store like a Beverly Hills housewife...

Janice Mathis
3 days ago


Still More Bar Tales
I had cornered myself again in the back of a dark biker bar with this large breasted babe who was busy demanding I make her my mistress,...

Scott C. Holstad
4 days ago


Blood Magick
I still feel you, a serpent in my veins. and wonder if I still pull you- Restless as the moon draws the sea. Yet what have we ever...

Bailey A Osullivan
4 days ago


A Small Town on the East Coast
It’s a place too oppressive for dreams to grow. The stubborn few that sprout, like dandelions between sidewalk slabs, are run over by...

Joe Couture
4 days ago


Money Managers in the Dayglo
I am singing again my odes to badness over the steel basin in the tired night routine singing morphine morphine a little...

Dan Duffy
4 days ago


Single Wide Sidekicks
As a child, you never give much thought to the location of your home or how it will affect you as an adult. For better or worse—it’s...

James William Wulfe
4 days ago


Dead Man’s Tongue
The dead man’s tongue wound round my throat and I tried to speak. My hands were dead with fingers. My eyes were dead with eyes. Just...

Susan Kay Anderson
4 days ago


When the Lights Fade
Look into the mirror an endless state of possibilities visions quadrupled but not for me. I'm an old-world star once popular with...

Justin Edse
5 days ago


Off to Work
Outside the oasis the cold burns And time lies frozen like the mud On the ground. Death rises from earth Wraps his hands round the wind...

Leslie Young
5 days ago


The Sweat from the Filthy Mattress Dreams
I think of all this while lungs press heavy dust away from un-covered mattress Dung heap with flies, we’ve seen the zoo ten times now ...

Lucio H Cooper
5 days ago


Old Dog
I grew tired of having nothing and no one, watching my features change like the seasons. A man only gets one Spring, and The Fall brings...

Ryan Fiennes
5 days ago


Lit Brawl I: 30 Writers. One Champion. All Blood.
Welcome to Lit Brawl— Lowlife Lit Press 's no-holds-barred, ink-splattered literary deathmatch. 30 writers enter. One walks away with the...

lowlifelitpress
May 4


The Back O’Town Hustle
Ray wiped sweat from his eyes and checked his watch again. Two hours late. The saxophonist should've been here by nine, but the Quarter...

James William Wulfe
May 7


Lit Brawl I: 30 Writers. One Champion. All Blood.
Welcome to Lit Brawl— Lowlife Lit Press 's no-holds-barred, ink-splattered literary deathmatch. 30 writers enter. One walks away with the...

lowlifelitpress
May 4


Litany of the Tongue—Ode to Oral
I have known religions that never asked for faith— only breath held between thighs, prayer in the shape of a moan. I do not speak your...

James William Wulfe
Apr 8


Beauty in Brutality
These mountains hold secrets. Why wouldn’t they? From the base of the holler to its cresting ridge. They’ve seen things our minds could...

James William Wulfe
Apr 1


Hollow Bones & Empty Crates
I often wonder if things will ever change. Louisiana nights are hot and sticky. Especially in an old southern home. The small structure...

James William Wulfe
Mar 30


Subtle Reminders
A warm pile of dog shit occupies the living room floor. The one-hundred-and-twenty-year-old pine floors absorb its nutrients and odor. I...

James William Wulfe
Mar 29


The Girl with the Blood-Red Lips
She walked into Pop’s Diner like she owned the place, red heels clicking against the tile, a cigarette holder dangling between her...

James William Wulfe
Mar 29


A Fistful of Rain
Jesse leans against the brick wall, feeling the rain soak through his shirt. He lights a cigarette, but it tastes like ashes. Across the...

James William Wulfe
Mar 27


Breath and Distance
Crouched between boxcars, fingers raw and split, face creased like worn leather from weather and want. His pocket holds nothing but a...

James William Wulfe
Mar 23


Call For Artwork
We’re looking for art that bleeds. Art that’s been kicked in the teeth, left in the gutter, and still crawls back with a story to tell....

lowlifelitpress
Mar 23


The Leprechaun War of Bourbon Street
The first little green bastard showed up on the corner of Royal and St. Peter, grinning at Seamus with a mouth full of gold teeth. Seamus...

James William Wulfe
Mar 21


The Graying Search
Twenty-two swipes left today. Twenty-two faces gleaming under ring lights, duck lips pursed like they're blowing kisses at bank accounts....

James William Wulfe
Mar 20
Lowlife Lit Press is a home for raw, uncompromising fiction and poetry that thrives on the fringes of society. It showcases work that dives into the underbelly of life—stories of drifters, hustlers, night-shift workers, addicts, dreamers, and survivors.
We don't care about your MFA. We care if your story makes us feel something.
Got something raw? Send it our way.
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