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Kate Garrett

@kategarrettwrites.bsky.social

An incomprehensible being in very strange surroundings (just like you). Writer in Shropshire. UoB PGR in English Lit - hauntology, ecoGothic landscapes, & Daphne du Maurier. 🖤 Spooky is a lifestyle not a season. (She/They)

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Kate Garrett@kategarrettwrites.bsky.social · 11mo ago

From today and through November, I'll be reading and responding to the spooky submissions sent to Mugwort for our special December issue, Spectral & Strange. 🖤 Submissions will open for 2026: Season 3 shortly!

Mugwort Magazine@mugwortmagazine.bsky.social · 11mo ago

Thank you to all who sent writing and art for Spectral & Strange! Submissions for the special issue are now closed. I'll be reading and responding to all of your otherworldly winter work from today, but please bear with me - it could take a few weeks to answer everyone (and I do answer everyone).

Kate Garrett@kategarrettwrites.bsky.social · last yr.

Writers, artists: send me your winter chills! That is to say, @mugwortmagazine.bsky.social is open for special issue submissions until 31/10. 🌿 Winter 2025: Spectral & Strange will be published in December. 🖤 Full guidelines are here: mugwortmag.wordpress.com/special-call...

Special Call for Submissions: Spectral & Strange

Over here where the mugwort grows year round, we believe in every season’s potential to be ‘spooky season’. However, we also believe that the most unsettling of all seasons begins…

mugwortmag.wordpress.com

Mugwort Magazine@mugwortmagazine.bsky.social · last yr.

Our Mugwort Magazine submissions inbox is OPEN until 31/10 for our special winter issue, Spectral & Strange, to be published in December. Check out the guidelines: mugwortmag.wordpress.com/special-call... ...then send us your best eerie, weird, or unsettling fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and art!

Kate Garrett@kategarrettwrites.bsky.social · last yr.

Our last @mugwortmagazine.bsky.social issue of 2025 is out now - Season 2: Volume 3. Maybe I'll see you in the submissions inbox when we open again on 1 November! Until then, happy reading.

Mugwort Magazine@mugwortmagazine.bsky.social · last yr.

Season 2: Volume 3 of Mugwort is here. As we move more fully into autumn, our last issue of 2025 covers much: from summer's end to frosty hints of winter, small joys & fears, natural & supernatural, tricks & treats. mugwortmag.wordpress.com We create from the edges, and it is beautiful here. 🖤🍂🍁

Kate Garrett@kategarrettwrites.bsky.social · last yr.

Yesterday it was chilly and raining and my son said the weather was nice. I said yes it is, makes you want to read and have ideas. Autumn is officially 'read and have ideas' season. ('Spooky season' is 30 October to 31 January, and no one can change my mind. A radical, scandalous opinion.)

Kate Garrett@kategarrettwrites.bsky.social · last yr.

Just before dawn in September is the best. While reading next to the window, I get to hear these lads making their 'this is my bit of woods! go away!' sounds at the same time. Poor owl. I always feel properly told off when tiny songbirds yell at me (especially robins, house sparrows & blackbirds).

Screenshot from the Merlin app, showing calls from a European Robin and a Tawny Owl.
Kate Garrett@kategarrettwrites.bsky.social · last yr.

Painfully aware I haven't had any Birb Drama to tell Bluesky about for ages. Wait: a couple of weeks ago the gulls were having issues with buzzards & cormorants, but I was busy & forgot to report back. But gull drama is barely even drama. It's just gulls. They're at it right now. It's their thing.

Mugwort Magazine@mugwortmagazine.bsky.social · last yr.

Hello writers! I originally hoped to respond to all subs by 1/7, but that's tomorrow & I'm still reading submissions. We've received more for Season 2 than for Season 1 - a beautiful problem to have, but it means I underestimated how long it would take to respond. I'll reply by this weekend! 💚

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Kate Garrett@kategarrettwrites.bsky.social · last yr.

Mugwort Magazine has just reopened for submissions. Please do send your 'writing from the edges' - I'll look forward to reading it!

Mugwort Magazine@mugwortmagazine.bsky.social · last yr.

Beltane / May Day greetings to you all! We are now open for 2025: Season 2 submissions at Mugwort until 31 May. 🌿 Full details in the guidelines - mugwortmag.wordpress.com/submission-g... 📷 ~ Bluebells (and dandelions) from my garden to celebrate the day.

A stem of 7 bluebell flowers with long green grass and a bright yellow dandelion flower in the background.
Kate Garrett@kategarrettwrites.bsky.social · 2y ago

Flowers, so many flowers. 😍 For those who prefer birds: I did meet a robin while taking these photos. He made it VERY CLEAR that I was to stay away from his property (an ornamental bush at the side of the castle), then hopped back into said property before I could take his photo. Noted, sir. 🫡

Pinkish white magnolia blossoms in the foreground, with branches of the same tree - plus more blossoms - and blue sky in the background.Close up of a cluster of tiny blue forget-me-not flowers with yellow and white centres, on a background of green leaves and more flowers Close up of fluffy white cherry blossoms with more blossom from the same tree in the background, with blue skies
Kate Garrett@kategarrettwrites.bsky.social · 2y ago

No photos but Mr Mallard is on the roof again, & he has a companion. Congrats to the happy couple on their seasonal pairing. May they have several beautiful weeks together! Also, the best bird thing in the mornings at the moment: the sound of Great spotted woodpeckers. 10/10 no notes. ❤️

Kate Garrett@kategarrettwrites.bsky.social · 2y ago

A spring prose poem of mine, 'Gently does it', posing with some scrappy primroses (they sprouted through cracks in the concrete in our garden) - a day late for the equinox, but on time for World Poetry Day. 🌿💛

Gently does it It takes time for the days to strengthen. We want the world to be golden and emerald when we open the door to a March morning – we want daffodils resting on clover, gilt eggs, the heat of day. But this light is lemon, the pale neutral of newborn swaddling blankets. This is still a chilly sun, but the breeze promises leaf buds and the answers to your prayers as a reward for your patience. There’s no need for a sacrifice – unless you want to give up everything that wastes your time, to make room for brighter beams when they at last shine across the path. Give thanks to the sun and the shadows while we are perfectly balanced, spinning in space. The story repeating here is undefined; the magic of renewal is one-size-fits-all. In Christ, they say, they are born again. But every spring we are all born again. Each rotation is a chance to greet the slow warming, ready to run – lips parted, a mouthful of song.
Kate Garrett@kategarrettwrites.bsky.social · 2y ago

Look, I haven't had any major bird drama to report since the cormorant & corvids business. However, it's now ducks-on-roofs season down here by the river. Spring has truly sprung. Had coffee with a mallard this morning (even if he didn't know what was going on). I just love ducks-on-roofs season. 🦆

Blurry zoomed in photo of a male mallard duck - brown and white body, orange legs and feet, emerald green head, yellow beak - on a brown rooftop with trees in the background.
Kate Garrett@kategarrettwrites.bsky.social · 2y ago

This morning, I got back from the school run & the crows over the river were agitated. Turned around to see what was up & there's a cormorant at the top of their tree. This afternoon, the crows were cross again. I looked out the window & the cormorant is BACK, looking around like 'lol what'.

Hedgehog Poetry Press@hedgehogpress.co.uk · 2y ago

COVER REVEAL:”Tree Poets : Flames of Ice” Well, our second in the series of Tree Poets - anthologies with a good chunk of work from Three Poets, if you missed the news release - really has started well and will continue for a wee while yet. The second in the series has a stunner of a cover, which…

COVER REVEAL:”Tree Poets : Flames of Ice”

Well, our second in the series of Tree Poets - anthologies with a good chunk of work from Three Poets, if you missed the news release - really has started well and will continue for a wee while yet. The second in the series has a stunner of a cover, which I am proud here to be revealing like a magician with an old tea towel over a load of gems on a tea tray.

hedgehogpress.co.uk