Military Experience and the Arts, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization whose primary mission is to work with veterans and their families to publish short stories, essays, poems, and artwork in our biannual publication, As You Were: The Military Review, periodic editions of Blue Nostalgia: The Journal of Post-Traumatic Growth and others. To the best of our ability, we pair each author or poet that submits work to us with a mentor to work one-on-one to polish their work or learn new skills and techniques.
Our staff is based all over the country and includes college professors, professional authors, veterans’ advocates, and clinicians. As such, most of our services are provided through email and online writing workshops. All editing, consultations, and workshops are free of charge. Veterans and their families pay nothing for our services, and they never will.
Since its inception as a 501(c)(3) in 2014, Military Experience and the Arts, Inc. has fostered the advancement of hundreds of veterans, servicemembers, and military families in their endeavors in the creative arts.
We’ve met these poets, writers, and artists where they are and helped them get to where they want to go with their chosen crafts. Sometimes that’s been through intensive one-on-one mentoring in a developmental revision process that reworks pieces while teaching valuable, universally applicable skills in creative expression. Often it is building upon or simply recognizing inherent strengths. Other times it’s answering questions about their chosen fields. Their efforts and interests are always respected, honored, and celebrated.
Numbers tell the tale.
As of May 2026, MEA has published 32 periodicals, including The Journal of Military Experience, The Blue Falcon Review, Blue Streak: A Journal of Military Poetry, Blue Nostalgia: A Journal of Post-Traumatic Growth, and our longest-running digital magazine, As You Were: The Military Review.
Contained within these publications are:
255 creative nonfiction stories
229 literary fiction stories
436 poems
140 art pieces
All told, 1,060 creative works have been published under our aegis.