Mercyhurst College’s annual literary magazine, the Lumen, is giving students a chance to see their creative work published for decades and is currently accepting submissions until Friday, Dec. 16.

Every spring, as a way of capping the annual Mercyhurst Literary Festival, a new issue of the Lumen is unveiled.

“The goal of the Lumen is to allow the chance for students to get their work published, and to become fully involved in the creative arts along with their fellow peers,” said Christina Mihalic, co-editor of this year’s Lumen.

But the content of the Lumen is not limited to what can be printed.

“For the last five or six years, Lumen has been a multimedia publication,” said Kenneth Schiff, Ph.D., associate professor of English and overseer of the Lumen’s publication.

Every hardcopy version of Lumen comes with an interactive CD that includes dance clips of student performances and music clips composed and performed by student musicians.

“I think it is very innovative,” said Schiff. “I don’t know of any other school that publishes their literary magazine as an interactive CD.”

Lumen has a prestigious reputation as well.

“Every year that I can recall, the Lumen has won awards for outstanding graphic design,” Schiff said.

The cover of the magazine as well as the contents of the interactive CD, are designed by graphic design students led by Jodi Staniunas-Hopper. Lumen is a collaborative effort, utilizing the talents of people from many different areas of study.

The finished product of the Lumen will be unveiled during a special reception on April 12, which will mark the end of the Mercyhurst literary festival. Attendees receive a copy of the magazine.

This year’s festival will include respected writers including science fiction author Terry Bisson and award-wining poet Jane Hirshfield.

The original deadline for submissions of poetry and short fiction for Lumen was Monday, Dec.13, but in an attempt to receive more submissions, Schiff has extended the deadline until Friday, December 16.

Students from any major who wish to submit their poetry or short fiction for possible inclusion in this year’s publication of The Lumen are encouraged to email their work to msullivan@mercyhurst.edu by Friday. The submissions should be in a Word document attachment, and the attachment should include the title of the work and the name of the author.

Students who would like feedback on poetry and other works are welcome to attend a bi-monthly meeting of the Dead Poet’s Revival poetry jam and can email Christina Mihalic at cmihal47@lakers.mercyhurst.edu for details.