Empty Mirror

a literary magazine

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Empty Mirror 25th Anniversary

Empty Mirror celebrated its 25th anniversary on May 31, 2025! While we are currently on hiatus, we invite you to enjoy a quarter century of writing and art in our archives.

Click to read any of the pieces featured below, read more from the category, or refresh the page for a fresh selection!

On Literature

The Invitation of the Mirror: Jonathan Lethem & Me, from the Margin to the Mainstream

Jasun Horsley

Independence Day by Richard Ford

Linda Lenhoff’s Top Ten Books

Top Ten List Contributor

More Essays and Interviews

Poetry

Hawaii sunset, copyright by goodmorph via sxc.hu

30 Years Between Letters, by Kirby Wright

Kirby Wright

Sunrise, courtesy http://www.sxc.hu/profile/jcash

6 short poems by Sparrow

Sparrow

More Poetry

Beat Generation

Ted Joans Lives! Tribute (7)

Empty Mirror

The Stray Bullet - William S. Burroughs in Mexico

Review – The Stray Bullet: William S. Burroughs in Mexico

Denise Enck

an interview with Carolyn Cassady

For Beat’s Sake: An Interview with Carolyn Cassady

Jon Alan Carroll

Seymour Wyse, Horace Mann School, 1940, courtesy of Dave Moore

Kerouac — “My really best friend…” an interview with Seymour Wyse by Dave Moore

Dave Moore

More About the Beat Generation

Visual Art

Divine Decay 14 (detail) by Kon Markogiannis

Divine Decay by Kon Markogiannis

Kon Markogiannis

100 Percent Real Live Art (detail) - Silas Plum

Silas Plum: Cardboard Primitives

Silas Plum

More Art

Essays

map and coffee / via unsplash

Becoming Jill Kerouac

Amelia Hruby

Great Northern Railway logo / Joe Mabel

How to Die Like You Meant It

Jeff Beddow

More Essays

The EM newsletter

Receive fresh poetry, reviews, essays, art, and literary news every Wednesday!

Empty Mirror

Established in 2000 and edited by Denise Enck, Empty Mirror is an online literary magazine that publishes new work each Friday.

Each week EM features several poems each by one or two poets; reviews; critical essays; visual art; and personal essays.

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