July has been an exciting month for the writers and staff at Okay Donkey: We have a slew of updates to our operations, staff, and site that are, dare we say, pretty cool in this inferno of a summer; a fresh batch of new work; and from Pushcart Prizes to new publications, many of our staff and former contributors have been earning their flowers this month. We also get to know new Associate Fiction Editor Gina Thayer, and fiction reader Damilola Omotoyinbo tells it like it is when it comes to just sitting down and writing.

Stay frosty with updates blasted into your inbox!

We have a redesigned website! Thanks to the hard work of Associate Poetry Editor and web developer Emily Blair, our site is now beautifully tidy and easily searchable and browsable. Plus our homepage has a SadJackpot machine that will pull random work for indecisive readers to view. Take a poke around and peep those new Sad Jacks courtesy of Cassey Abella!

We also have a brand new Bookshop.org storefront, where you can order books by our contributors and staff to directly support OKD.

Contributors to Okay Donkey should get hype as our honorariums are increasing from $20 to $25 per poem or piece of flash, effective August 1. Get submitting! Our free submissions open on the first of every month until we hit our cap, but our Tip Jar and Expedited submissions are always open. And remember: We do NOT want anything written by AI, LLM, etc. Speaking of our submissions…

Want to become a poetry reader for OKD? Then you are in luck because we’re taking applicants now through the end of the month. Fill out the form here.

In other news, Okay Donkey wants to congratulate former Reader Gina Thayer on becoming an associate fiction editor. We asked Gina about what the OKD brand is to them and their vision for their expanded role on staff.

Gina Thayer (she/they) is an associate fiction editor. Gina’s work has appeared or is forthcoming in Barrelhouse, Cotton Xenomorph, Sundog Lit, Five South, Lunch Ticket, trampset, Bullshit Lit, and HAD, among others, and her short story “Only Willow” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Gina holds an MFA in writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts and is currently working on a collection of speculative stories. After several years in the Pacific Northwest, Gina now lives in Minneapolis with their partner and cat.

I want to read the stories that people are excited about submitting! Those pieces that you’re almost a little nervous to send out because they feel personal or risky in some way. That type of work has an energy behind it, I think. Aesthetically, I love writing that’s unexpected, surreal, maybe a little bit haunted. I especially gravitate toward stories that lean into ambiguity while still offering something satisfying and tangible to hold onto. Give me an uneasy fable with complex internal stakes and a dash of body horror, and I will be CHUFFED! I’m also hoping to read and publish stories that subvert the Other, queer narratives, and pieces that draw from different literary traditions or are experimenting with craft in a surprising way.

See above! I definitely lean toward the speculative, especially if there’s a horror angle or an underlying element of restlessness or disorientation. Something that signals we’ve deviated from the norm. I like to be unsettled. But maybe even more than a specific aesthetic approach, my brand of OKD off-kilter might be about curiosity. I’m thinking about stories that invite curiosity in the reader, but also where the story itself is curious about something—it hasn’t decided from the first sentence where it’s going to go. A curious piece keeps the reader on their toes, which is a very off-kilter place to be! Especially if you’re a donkey and you don’t even have toes to begin with (though I feel like Sad Jack is a sturdy donkey with excellent balance, so maybe this doesn’t apply...).

Getting to work with really cool writers, readers, and editors! There’s such a collaborative spirit at OKD, and I’m excited to spend more time with a truly thoughtful and committed team of editors and readers. And of course, extremely brilliant writers. We do a fair amount of development work at OKD, so I’m looking forward to honing those skills too, and to hopefully offer writers useful, supportive thoughts in service of their vision. I feel quite spoiled because OKD receives so many creative and compelling submissions every month, and it’s energizing to be reminded how expansive and multi-faceted flash fiction can be. I’m looking forward to spending more time in that delicious literary soup!

by Damilola Omotoyinbo, Fiction Reader

I recently completed Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott and On Writing by Stephen King—these two are easily my favorite craft books. As you learn about plot, dialogue, style, description, and all, you also feel hands patting you on your back—you hear voices telling you they understand what it means to live with the rejections and self-doubt that come with writing.
I think it is pretty when you see your insecurities and fears written in the best ways you could have expressed them. As Anne Lamott said, “When writers make us shake our heads with the exactness of their prose and their truths, and even make us laugh about ourselves or life, our buoyancy is restored. We are given a shot at dancing with, or at least clapping along with, the absurdity of life, instead of being squashed by it over and over again.”

I have been writing for a while, yet I still get anxious about writing—I got anxious about this piece. I wonder if another writer somewhere has not written the same thing, and what new idea I can give my readers. I am concerned about the language and depth of my ideas. I check the length and weight of my sentences, but I have to remind myself why it is important to write my truth, while being honest and vulnerable. I remind myself why I need to write and write, and allow the piece to prove itself. Without me trying to stifle it or make it become something it is not. “I have spent a good many years since—too many, I think—being ashamed about what I write,” writes Stephen King.

In the past couple of months, I have seen writing through a different lens. I have done things with my writing that I truly enjoy. I did two weeks of consistent writing, making sure I wrote at least 500 words each night before bed, and a month where I just made sure I wrote something, regardless of how short it was. The goal was to stay consistent and to vet my progress against what I learned from these books. Below is a list of things I learned from the process. I don't claim to know everything it takes to be a good writer, but I think this is worth sharing.

Write down the first thought that comes to your head, just like I am doing now. Let it flow. Just write and keep writing. Write for as long as the words keep coming because if you allow it to flow freely, you will write for a long time. Most writers don’t know everything they want to write the minute they start; they just write.

Don’t be like that Newbie writer, who wants to write a perfect first draft. Don’t compare your first draft with the novel of your favorite author. That work has undergone many rounds of editing and rewriting. You are allowed to read your favorite book to learn about the writing craft and for research. But don’t compare.

Leave editing for later. I suggest that you finish the entire piece before you start editing. You can go through different rounds of editing when the draft is done. But make sure you finish the first draft. Keep writing even if you think you are making a mess; that is the fun of it.

You are doing well. You are writing the best thing you can write at this point in your career. You are on the path to writing something great as long as you do not quit. I know how hard it feels when the sentence on the page does not sound like what you have in your head. But the fact that you have something great in your head shows that you have an idea worth developing.

This is a voice you will always live with—you can’t get rid of it. And you would need it on days your work is actually crap. It will give you the courage to discard the piece and start again. Because you will surely write crap. You will write sentences that deserve nothing but being treated as crap— till then, silence that voice.

Write and do not stop writing. You can take a break, but don’t stop even when nobody seems to care. You can’t get better at it if you do not keep doing it. The blank page can be scary, but how about you write the first sentence that comes to your mind? It does not have to be perfect. Write because you need to.

Many writers talk about writing but never read, and I often wonder what they are writing about. Read, not just the good works but the bad ones. Because you will never know how not to write a bad piece if you don’t experience it, and it is in reading bad writing that you discover why you owe your readers some good stuff.

There are days you need to take some time off writing because you need to rest or see the world. You deserve the rest, and whether consciously or unconsciously, you are also gathering ideas for your future projects.

We love when past contributors keep us updated on their lives! If your work has ever appeared in OKD, reach out and tell us about your new book, project, album, etc. We’ll give you a shoutout on our socials and here in the newsletter. You can also check out our library on Bookshop.org to support our community of writers!

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