Our policy is that we don’t eat, drink, or sleep until we finish proofreading the forthcoming issue. However, when Assistant Editor Matt McBride learned of the following, recent change to The Chicago Manual of Style he stiffened, stopped blinking in response to stimuli, and developed an impressive head of mouth-foam: “In a return to the 14th edition of the manual, the generic term in a proper noun is uppercased if used in the plural (e.g., Fifty-Fifth and Fifty-Seventh Streets, the Thames and Mersey Rivers, the American and French Revolutions).”
We’re glad Matt snapped out of it on his own. We don’t have time to hydrate, so we sure as hell don’t have time to pause for emergency medical procedures. We’re proofreading.
While we double-check the uppercase plurals of our proper nouns, we hope you enjoy these behind-the-scenes contributor comments from our current issue:
Susan Davis: “Gravity” is an associative poem that develops in its speaker’s head as she immerses herself in setting. I like such poems because they are a ride in the quality of someone else’s mind. Sometimes we have to hang on; sometimes we are comforted. I was surprised where this poem ended up, and hopefully that’s a good thing.
Matthew Pitt: “These Are Our Demands” is rooted in my fascination with the ways adults (often those most blessed with privilege and means) gird and steel against crisis—even potential crisis, crisis in the abstract—then seem dumbfounded when they can’t shake health problems, when lines of communication with loved ones break down, when anxiety becomes a constant companion. I wonder if this obsession with driving out darkness instead drives out any opening for serenity or solace: Can you ball your fists and receive beauty at the same time? Finally, I was interested in the notion that having to combat, or anticipate, crisis constantly could become a turn-on; become the stand-in for beauty.
