Serving House Journal endeavors to publish works in the literary and visual arts that will surprise, rivet, amuse, charm, enchant — even electrify — our readers.

Our mission is to play an international role in fostering and preserving the best of what the literary arts are capable of doing: writing that may impel others to become writers themselves; writing that will add to and enhance the dialogue of the arts; writing that reaffirms our belief in the inspiring possibilities of the written word.

We celebrate the imaginative voice, the authentic non-serviam attitude towards the status quo “world of letters.” We like lean-edgy-elegant writing that takes on the stupefying realities of our challenging times, our thorny relationships, the political chicanery that exhausts our patience, the contraries between men, women, children, and friends.

We’re looking for work that strives to eclipse clichés, stereotypes, and mass-market formulas gleaned from what has become more and more a “reality show,” a “sit-com,” a stultifying Wal-Mart of the mind.

“Expect poison from standing water,” William Blake once told us. “The cistern contains; the fountain overflows” (Line 35, “The Proverbs of Hell”).

Inscribe the flow of the world as you see it. Send that world to us. We promise you a fair reading.