Dear Readers,
Fall is the time of wooden ghosts. All my dreams have been about ghosts. You can easily blame the seasons: the leaves are incandescent with death. But something happened in my life right before issue 8.1 came out. It mimicked a poem we already selected for publication in this issue, 8.2: Dara Goodale’s “Commune with the dead via voicemail.” I got word my dear friend had passed, I yelled a bad word, and then called him up immediately. He—as you might imagine—didn’t answer. So, this issue, for me, is haunted.
Meanwhile, voicemails fill up until they are no longer useable. Meanwhile, the birds are departing. Meanwhile, the moon goes through its phases. Meanwhile, the vultures usher home the roadkill. Meanwhile, it’s colder, and I feel alone. It’s hard not to go bleak in the face of so much bleakness.
I once told my friend that I have a hard time being vulnerable. I’m loud and crass and abrasive. Affection does not come easily to me. But there is, luckily, a secret to saying something soft: stick it in parentheses, so that no one can hurt it, ever. Instead of writing “I love you,” write “(I love you),” and then nothing will ever undo it.
The imaginative leap between parentheses and thimbles is not far. If you can’t do big things to keep yourself safe, do small things. Hold your hands over your head if it starts to hail, or curve them into parentheses if you have to say something important.
(Thank you for being here.)
(The poet Laurie Koensgen is right: the moon is a scar is a moon is a scar.)
(This structure is for you, if you need it, too.)
(But this one is for Ian.)
(Love,)
Nadia Arioli
