The Columbia Journal is now open for submissions to our annual Spring Contest in fiction, nonfiction, and poetry.
The Watchers And The Watched
Nobody in the stairwells. Nobody on the street. Nobody in the alleyway. Nobody beside Mister Maharashi. They both decide again that they must just be...
Call for Submissions: Black History Month Special Issue
At the Columbia Journal, we believe in creating space for and celebrating traditionally underrepresented voices. While we pursue this aim year round, this February marks...
The Most Anticipated Fiction of 2020
The Fiction Editors of the Journal have put together a list of their most anticipated releases in fiction for 2020.
Happy Holidays from Columbia Journal!
This holiday season, we're snuggling up with good books and dreams for the new decade. In case you're as much a fan of nostalgia as...
Sit and Be Fit
Penny liked climbing into my bed. I was underweight and short for even a younger kid’s age, and Penny often let me use her as...
Cat Acne
Tom, as I've gotten around to naming him with all this spare time, handles these real or imaginary slights with a unique, dignified nonchalance while...
War and Discord
The fighting drowned the Earth. The soil went from brown to red, everywhere you stepped made a river of blood flow.
Diving In
Sweat collects on our skin, rolls down the folds of our limbs in rivers. I look out the small round window at the steel blue...
Thanksgiving Fiction: Other People
Dressing, not stuffing. That’s a distinction she clings to even after all these years up north. Her worn hands crumble cornbread and white bread together...
The Boxer
Yi continued training, but he lost whatever hope he used to have; gone was the certainty in his steps and the hunger in his swings....
WERALL Pro-Choice
The revolving door rolled her out onto a bustling, uncaring sidewalk where an early winter wind whetted its taste for exposed flesh.