Purchasing and Subscriptions

Issue 2.3 can be ordered from the Caffeinated Press online store.

Table of Contents

From the Editor’s Desk (editorial)
Elyse Lowery – 3 poems (“Crosshatch”, “Five Cigars”, “Blood and Diamonds”)
Nancy Ellis Taylor – 2 poems (“Queen Elizabeth I Ponders the Northwest Passage”, “Julian of Norwich: Mystic”)
David Marquard – 3 poems (“A Note Spoken in Longhand”, “Casket Talk: Three Letters”, “Embalm the Land”)
Hannah Ford – Remembering (fiction)
Jack Ridl – 2 poems (“Everything Bloomed Earlier This Year”, “Walking His Dog After Dinner”)
Wally Swist – 4 poems (“Brook Run”, “Present Time”, “Anita”, “Meeting Amichai”)
Ariel Kaplowitz – 2 poems (“Nothing Town”, “Now We Love Each Other”)
Kate Colburn – 2 poems (“At the Restaurant Down the Way”, “Pagan Benediction or What is Left Behind”)
Phillip Sterling – Lanie and the Cougar (fiction)
David Beebe – 5 poems (“Sundogs”, “Wild Ones”, “Muskegon”, “By Way of Croton”, “Fort Gibson”)
David LaBounty – 1 poem (“The Traverse City Mechanic”)
Morris Lincoln – Second Chances (essay)
Allyson Hoffman – 2 poems (“Scoliosis, Winter 2007”, “My Uncle is Living A Little Bit Longer”)
Christina M. Rau – 2 poems (“Winnowing”, “Blue Ribbon Fair”)
Z.G. Tomaszewski – 2 poems (“In Those Old Westerns, Early Magic”, “Ceremony”)
Sydney McCann – The Histories We Build (essay)
Tyler C. Dempsey – The Magic Bus (creative nonfiction)
Jason Gillikin – From the Corner Office (editorial)

Cover photography courtesy of Rebecca L. Thompson

From the Editor’s Desk

Welcome to the seventh issue of The 3288 Review. As I write this I am sitting at my table next to an open window in the middle of February in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Such are winters here in the upper Midwest.

The beginning of 2017 marks a turning point of sorts for Caffeinated Press. We’ve been around for two years! Not bad for a small indie publisher with a regional focus. And with this issue of the journal we have published submissions from over 100 contributors. We are proud of the work we do, and continually humbled by the quality of the creative work which crosses our desk every day.

With each issue we have increased the number of printed pieces by West Michigan contributors. Three quarters of the current issue comes from local talent. And that brings me to our first significant change to the journal. Starting with volume 3 we will only accept submissions from contributors who are residents of West Michigan, or have some significant connection to this area of the state. Narrowing our focus has been an editorial goal since we published our first issue, and with the volume of submissions we receive, we feel that it is now possible to make that leap.

This leads me to our second major change: starting with Volume 3, The 3288 Review will be published two times a year instead of four. Issues will hit the stands in April and October. While there were many reasons for this change, it really came down to this: Running a literary journal takes a lot of time. Our journal staff consists of five people. We receive an average of 225 submission per issue, each of which needs to be read and responded to. Production of each issue is extremely time- and labor- intensive. So we are scaling our publication schedule to better match the hours we have available.

So what does this mean for our contributors? If you are a current or former resident of West Michigan, or have other significant ties to the region, nothing will change. If you are not a West Michigander, we thank you for your interest and support of our endeavors. We could not have got where we are without you.

What does this mean for our readers? Twice a year we will treat you to a carefully curated collection of the finest writing and artwork West Michigan has to offer. We plan to expand our repertoire to include online content, book reviews, and greatly expanded interaction and collaboration with the creators of arts and letters in the region.

And what does this mean for the arts and letters community of West Michigan? You will see more of us! And you will see more of you within our pages. Since the last issue hit the stands we have been hard at work connecting with creative people; visiting art galleries, reading books, conducting interviews and listening to poetry. Person to person, face to face, in direct conversation. Being not just of the community, but in the community.

There is one more milestone which we plan to reach in the next issue: Book reviews. We feel it is time our journal lived up to its name. We want to make the reviews a regular feature of both the print magazine and our website, so we are looking for books published by West Michigan writers. We are also happy to review books written by people previously published in our pages, no matter their connection to the region. Ideally these would be recently published books of any length and genre—fiction, nonfiction, poetry, anthologies, collections and chapbooks. Right now we have a small pile of review copies in our office, which been growing steadily January. If the review possibilities increase at the same rate as did our publication submissions, we may need to bring on additional staff. That would be a good problem to have.

As always, many thanks to our readers and the staff of The 3288 Review and Caffeinated Press. This year is off to a great start.