EDITOR’S NOTE

Dear reader,

I write this to you from the porch of a log cabin in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula where, with my morning coffee in hand, I am captivated by a community of ducks diving for their breakfast in the nearby pond. As if guided by some invisible ritual of time, the ducks move through a rhythmic motion of tucking their bills into the water, sending their feathery butts up to the heavens with a powerful kick of their webbed feet, and returning upright with a bite to eat. The water’s inner contents are shielded by thick clumps of algae, and I wonder if the ducks can see through the water’s opacity, if they know what lives beyond the veneer of mirror and silt. Or rather, do the ducks dive headfirst into the water despite the harms that might lurk beyond? I’m impressed by their ability to live in accordance with their instinct. It is their nature to dive, to search through the abyss, to find sustenance, to find home in the water.

I look beyond the ducks to see a squirrel pluck a red-capped russula mushroom, her own version of breakfast, and carry it under a cedar canopy, helping the mushroom spread its spores across the forest floor. I see star thistle, mountain mint, mullein in its third year, death bloom rising.

These small forest epiphanies just beyond my porch are a reminder that nature’s ecosystems and its countless denizens are a sublime example of the cooperation it takes to build the world.

And yet, the air is thick with haze. Wildfires. It’s no secret that we are living through the pages of some far-off history textbook. Each day brings a new horror, whether it’s floods or famine or fascism. As writers, it’s our job to turn, as Vivian Gornick would say, “the situation” into “the story.” We show up for our communities by bearing witness, by gathering stories for future generations, and by not letting atrocities slip past public accountability. But when do we transition from experiencing to synthesizing? Where is the barrier between “living amidst” and “having lived through?” Having survived?

It's easy to get lost in the wilderness of our minds. In her story “Vaster Than Empires and More Slow” Ursula K LeGuin wrote “We all have forests in our minds. Forests unexplored, unending. Each of us gets lost in the forest, every night, alone.” But when we are ready, we find that narrow path out of the woods, that kernel of inspiration, and we begin the work.

We have a role to play in supporting our own ecosystems, but that role is dynamic and ever-changing and, most importantly, alive. Nature shows us how necessary it is to change, to adapt. No structure, especially human-made, is immovable. My god, earthquakes have reversed the directions of rivers.

This act of creation, of making space for our vision of the world, is our most potent form of power. Issue #168 of TriQuarterly is our own proverbial forest filled with visions of fantastic worlds, characters, and stories that will lead you to the familiar and the strange alike. Follow the quilt of voices like a scatter of constellations, a map among the stars, where the night is “a hundred thousand tender, expectant eyes.” — Christopher Murphy, 168

“In the dark, every sound is an object without a boundary.” — Tyler Raso, 168

“Not so very long ago, I was ripe / and moon-heavy.  Everything was future.” — Alice Ashe, 168

“The combs have been sucked of the last bits of summer.” — Stacy Gnall, 168

“I watched and was never told to look away.” — Christina Santi, 168

“fluorescents bearing down / like a strange heaven.” — Ezra Fox, 168

“All the dark birds / I named for myself take flight.” — Emily Adams-Aucoin, 168

My deepest gratitude goes to all those that make TriQuarterly the thriving ecosystem it is– my fellow editors Hannah Bonner, Starr Davis, Dan Fliegel, Jennifer Companik, Patrick Bernhard, Emily Mirengoff, and Laura Joyce-Hubbard, as well as our visionary readers and contributors, advisors Colin Pope and Natasha Trethewey, and Northwestern’s English department. TriQuarterly has undergone eras of change since its inception, and issue #168 is a testament to the magazine’s resilience, adaptability, and dedication to featuring works that test the boundaries of modern literature.

Annie Dillard once wrote in response to the classic philosophical conundrum about the tree falling in the forest– “The answer must be, I think that beauty and grace are performed whether or not we will or sense them. The least we can do is try to be there.”

Maybe we will find each other in this wild forest. Maybe we can help each other through.

Sincerely,

– Jess Masi, Managing Editor

MASTHEAD

Managing Editor: Jess Masi

Faculty Advisor: Natasha Trethewey

Staff Advisor: Colin Pope

Film Editor: Hannah Bonner

Fiction Editors: Jennifer Companik, Emily Mirengoff, Patrick Bernhard, Laura Joyce-Hubbard

Nonfiction Editor: Starr Davis

Poetry Editor: Daniel Fliegel

Readers: Nathalie Bonds, Erika Carey, Eleanor Colligan, Liz Howey, Nathaniel Forester, Jess Limardo, Claire Moacdieh, Sarbani Mukherjee, Amanda Norton, Paula Nwosu, Andrew Stojkovich, genea tafesse, Amanda Vitale, Jeremy Wilson, Eileen Zampa, Jodi Cressman, Amanda Dee, Kristi Ferguson, Susan Lerner, Jenna Mather, Andi Myles, Sarah Minor, Kathryn O'Day, Lauren Short, Yvonne W, Kelsey Werkheiser, D.S. Winters, Christine Barkley, William Ward Butler, Daylyn Carrigan, Abigail Chang, Cindy King, Jessica Manack, Amanda Maret Scharf, Tanya Young

Summer 2025 Interns: Sarkis Antonyan, Helen Gu, Ethan Kwak, Ocean Teu