WWPH Writes Issue 108…wraps up a very busy end of October for your Washington Writers’ Publishing House. This week, we announced our 2025 Fiction Prize Winner, Samantha Neugebauer of Washington, DC, for her debut short story collection, UNCERTAIN TIMES. Our new slate of books, which also includes poetry collections by Emily Holland, Jason Gebhardt, and Yael Kiken, will launch in January 2027. In more news of the week, we were thrilled to be interviewed by Grace Cavalieri for The Poet and the Poem, her long-running (50 years!) program now with the Library of Congress. Find us here with Grace discussing our landmark anthology, AMERICA’S FUTURE: poetry & prose in response to tomorrow.
This issue features works from three acclaimed writers: poetry by Chet’la Sebree and Stacy L. Spencer along with short fiction by Hannah Grieco (Hannah will lead a creative writing workshop at our last WWPH Literary Salon of 2025 on Sunday, November 2nd at Solid State Books in Washington, DC. See below for details!)
November is even more packed for your WWPH! Join us at upcoming readings with The Inner Loop in Washington, DC (November 10th) and Reston Used Bookstore in Reston, VA (November 16). We would love to meet you in real life.
Read on!
Caroline Bock & Jona Colson
co-presidents/editors
WWPH WRITES POETRY
Chet’la Sebree is the author of the poetry collections Blue Opening; Field Study, winner of the 2020 James Laughlin Award from the Academy of American Poets; and Mistress, nominated for an NAACP Image Award. Her debut essay collection TURN (W)HERE: A Geography of Home is forthcoming in 2026. She has received fellowships from the Hawthornden Foundation, Hedgebrook, MacDowell, and Yaddo and has been published in The Kenyon Review, The Yale Review and Lit Hub among other venues. Currently, she’s an assistant professor at the George Washington University and faculty in Randolph College’s Low-Residency MFA in Creative Writing program.
“Up in the Air” from BLUE OPENING: POEMS by CHET’LA SEBREE © Copyright. Used with permission of the publisher, Tin House, an imprint of Zando, LLC.
Purchase the entire collection here.
Stacy L. Spencer is a poet, fiction writer, and nonprofit advisor. She has recently won the 18th Mudfish Poetry Prize judged by Pulitzer Prize winner Vijay Seshadri. She serves on the board of Alice James Books. Stacy lives in Alexandria with her husband and mini dachshund.
WWPH WRITES FICTION
TRADITION
by Hannah Grieco
I met Jody on J-date. I didn’t plan on dating a Jewish girl, but my mom insisted I owed her at least this. AT LEAST THIS, she said, and sent me an article on Huffington Post about lesbians and J-date and holding on to tradition.
“Don’t start on not having kids,” she pleaded. “Gays have kids all the time.”
“Yes, mom,” I said and downloaded the app. Jody’s androgynous face was the first one I clicked on.
I’m a social worker for the city. I love to rock climb and watch documentaries. I’m looking for a femme with long hair. Healthy, pretty, and lets me lead.
I messaged her immediately.
I’m not the person for you, I said. But my mom’s begging me to fuck a Jewish girl. Any interest?
I sent her a topless photo, my shaved head and boxers clearly visible.
We fucked that night and I fell in love with her as we watched a documentary afterwards, as I sobbed into her chest, her tight sports bra drenched from my tears, as that baby hippo got eaten, absolutely mauled, by its own father.
“You’re not what I expected,” Jody whispered, holding me close.
“I’m not femme at all,” I said, my snot running down onto her rough skin. And she laughed and used the pillowcase to wipe it off.
“You’re femme as fuck,” she said and turned the volume up, the hippo mother’s bellows in my ears as Jody pushed me down, her entire hand inside me, and I came hard, still crying, like I was grieving some huge, encompassing loss. Why can’t I come without crying, I wanted to know, but oh—her mouth on me, her breath on my skin.
I arched up, thinking about my senior year of high school when my grandmother died, when I let Ben eat me out against the back wall of the temple as the limousines lined up around the corner. When he worked at me for twenty minutes, and I pictured girl after girl and still couldn’t feel a thing. Until my mom yelled for me and I shoved him away, pulled down my skirt and ran back to the front to join my family.
“Sorry,” I’d said as he wiped his mouth, his sad eyes making me wish I’d just faked it.
“Sorry,” I said to Jody and she laughed and pulled my arms around her, the hippo mother’s moans quieting to grunts as she gave up and swam away.
Originally published in Passages North, and now part of First Kicking, Then Not stories by Hannah Grieco (Stanchion, 2025). Reprinted in WWPH Writes with permission of the author. ©Hannah Grieco. As the author notes about her debut collection: A young woman transforms after an unspeakable loss. A recent divorcee discovers a new life. An aging mother fears losing everything she loves, while another abandons her children at Starbucks. First Kicking, Then Not introduces these women and many more, all of whom are hungry to know who they are outside the expectations of others.
Purchase the entire must-read collection here
Hannah Grieco’s short story collection First Kicking, Then Not is available now from Stanchion. Her writing has been published in The Washington Post, The Independent, Al Jazeera, Huffington Post, Brevity, Craft, Poet Lore, Shenandoah, Fairy Tale Review, The Offing, and more. She writes a monthly literary column for the Washington City Paper and edits prose for a variety of independent presses and literary journals. Find her online at www.hgrieco.com and on most social media @writesloud.
WWPH WRITES NEWS
AMERICA’S FUTURE…be the first to read. Now available for everywhere books/ebooks are sold. AMAZON. BOOKSHOP. BARNES & NOBLE. or maximize your support here at WWPH DIRECT.
Special discounts for classroom orders for educators. Please contact Caroline at wwphpress@gmail.com
OUR LAST LITERARY SALON OF 2025! DON’T MISS!
2025 FICTION Prize Winner. $1,500 Award. Publication. Editorial and Launch Support.
For those planners in the community: We will be opening our manuscript contests in fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction (memoir or essay) in the spring of 2026. Keep reading WWPH Writes for details.
WWPH Writes is now open for submissions! We are reading for 2026, including poetry, flash fiction, and creative nonfiction (1,000 words or less). We are looking for your authentic voice; lines that thrill and surprise us; poetry and stories from writers across DC, Maryland and Virginia. We are a paying market: $25.00 to you, with our hope that you pay it forward and buy a book from a small press. And, we are free to submit to! More details on our Submittable site here.