Dear Reader,
In this anthology, writers, both established and emerging, offer prose and poetry that embrace the theme of edges. These works explore the edges of cultures and country, the edges of language, the edges of space, the edges of gender, of the mind and body. They allow us to consider both self-imposed limits and externally-imposed limitations.
Nathalie Handal’s poem Edge, gives language to the heart of our inquiry.
“she stares at the world,
takes it to the edge of
all the words
men weren’t able to invent.”
An edge offers imagery of the margins, the fringes, the brink and the precipice. An edge also promises the vision of possibility, of what lay beyond the limits we would often rather not live within.
“if the dream is to go beyond empire
if the dream is to stretch our extremities
all the way thru…”
–Lucas de Lima, pinto (“chick” and slang for “penis” in brazilian portuguese)
The writers in this collection explore these possibilities personally, figuratively, and politically. In Andrea Jeftanovic’s short story, The disquiet of being Anonymous, two characters struggle for intimacy in spite of walls, windows, and the loneliness of modernity. In Vi Khi Nao’s The Launch, womb and the word are blurred, literal and literary creation are interchangeable.
At a time where we seem to need so many boundaries— both as protection and to assert and affirm our agency—these works probe what it might mean to move beyond our limits. While we might imagine these boundaries as hard and inflexible, this anthology aspires to salve and inspire all of us who have—especially, lately—been on edge. Nicole Callihan meditates on softness, and Shay Lawz reminds us:
“A child is an open body”
and
“No woman should ever be ashamed.”
Contributors include: Rosa, Alcala, Laylah Ali, Nicole Calihan, Nathalie Handal, Andrea Jeftanovic, Shay Lawz, Lucas de Lima, Leila Nadir, Vi khi Nao, J. C. Reyes, Flavia Rocha, Malvinna Sammarone, Sue Scavo, Olivia Walton
