Call for Submissions

Abstractions of Existence

Abstractions of Existence is a live, improvised composition in sound between Miguel Torres (music) and Amanda Aileen Fisher (voice), composed through attention and featuring Abre Tu Boca writers.

Friday, February 2
in Yao
during Todos Santos Art Walk
5:00–10:00 PM

This is not a reading in the traditional sense. It is a ritualized performance of emergence — a live exchange between music and voice, composed in real time through listening. Throughout the evening, Miguel Torres (music) and Amanda Aileen Fisher (voice) will be creating the work moment by moment, responding to what the music, the room, and the field of attention ask for next.

Writers are invited into this field as activated instruments.

If selected, your role will be to wait, listen, and enter only when cued — at the precise moment the music opens space for language to appear. You will not know when you will be called. You will not know which piece will be asked for first. Your task is not to perform, but to listen deeply enough to let the writing arise as part of the composition.

This is an offering of presence, not presentation.

Please read everything below before submitting your writing.

The Call for Writing

We’re seeking original writing that can emerge through sound rather than sit on top of it.

Let your words rise from the threshold between form and formlessness — from sketches, impressions, haze, sensing, and moments where clarity is still becoming. From knowing that arrives through unknowing. From seeking, from finding, from being found.

We’re especially drawn to writing that carries sound in its body — rhythm, cadence, repetition, breath, resonance — when these arise naturally from the piece itself.

Short, potent work is best. Writing that can enter, touch, and leave a trace.

All genres and all languages are welcome.

Submission Guidelines

  • Your piece must have originated from an Abre Tu Boca prompt or gathering (circle, event, online, or writing camp from any season).

  • The piece may now be in a different draft or form.

  • You may submit up to 3 pieces for consideration.

  • Each piece may be up to 800 words (shorter is often stronger).

  • Clean, finished writing only. What you submit should be the version you are willing to place into a live composition.

  • All languages welcome.

  • If submitting multiple pieces, please submit them as separate entries through the submission form.

Curatorial Process

Selections will be made with both care and compositional awareness.

This is not about choosing the “best” writing, but about shaping a field.

Writers will be placed into arcs, each with multiple movements. Pieces will be curated in relation to tone, rhythm, silence, and emergence, so that the evening itself becomes a singular artwork.

Some pieces may be used more than once. Some may not be read in full. Some may be held until the final moments. This is part of the live nature of the work.

By submitting, you are agreeing to enter a process of listening and trust.

If Your Work Is Selected

  • You will be assigned to Arc I (6–8 PM) or Arc II (8–10 PM)

  • You will be present in the space for your assigned arc

  • You will be cued live by Amanda during the composition

  • You will be acknowledged as a contributing writer to the work

  • This may be included on your CV or portfolio as a curated live performance

Submission Fee

100 MXN / 5 USD per piece

This offering supports the curatorial, editorial, and compositional labor behind the work and helps sustain Abre Tu Boca as a living, global practice. Submission fees directly supports scholarships for Abre Tu Boca Method Training, making the work accessible to writers and guides across different regions and economic realities.

If the fee is a barrier, please reach out — we will make space.

Deadline

Submit by January 26

Selections announced January 30

A Final Note

This is not an open mic.
This is not a performance in the usual sense.

It is an invitation to listen so deeply that language knows when to arrive.

If your piece is not selected, know that this is not a measure of worth or quality. It is a compositional decision — one voice among many shaping a shared field.

Keep writing.
Keep listening.
Abre Tu Boca.

Submit Your Writing Here.