Introduction to this Issue There are few things in this world as pleasurable as publishing and editing a magazine dedicated to poetry. The process of selection and reading is always exciting and often surprising. You get to see new work and to make new friends. Our work on this issue turned out to be more than the usual, that is, it turned out to be very exciting and very surprising, and produced an unexpected result: This much longer issue than we had planned. We had thought for some time to do an anthology issue of work from Deaf, Disabled, and Neurodivergent (including Autistic) poets. Our mission statement embraces diversity, and we have been committed to publishing this marginalized and too-often overlooked group since the magazine’s founding. The minianthology of neurodivergent poets we included in the Fall 2018 issue was very strong, and warranted, we believed, a deeper and more extensive look. We started out to do a single anthology issue, and then an amazing thing happened: The response to our solicitation was overwhelming, an outpouring of quality work so powerful that the only way we could accommodate it was to convert the proposed single issue into this double issue. One other smart thing we did was to ask Diane Wiener to edit the issue. Diane is a published poet (The GolemVerses, Nine Mile Books, 2018) and disability advocate deeply committed to the work of these poets. Her essay, included in this issue, provides context and helpfully grounds the work included. It is our pleasure to present this work, knowing that as big as this issue is, we have barely scratched the surface. Steve Kuusisto Andrea Scarpino Bob Herz Volume 7 - Page 21
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