The first order of business this issue is to thank all those who contributed to this spring’s Connect the Ducts campaign to redesign and modernize our website. With your generosity and help, we reached our goal, and the new redesign is finally here for many more new issues to come.

Second order of business is to congratulate our arts editor, Jacqueline Bishop, on winning the 2016 Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature in the nonfiction category with her book, The Gymnast; and to welcome our brand new essays editor, Voichita Nachescu! In fact, Voichita kicked off her inaugural issue by interviewing Jacqueline about The Gymnast, art, feminism, and the current state of Caribbean literature, and the resulting conversation is featured in our essays section.

Finally, don’t miss outstanding fiction, memoir, and poetry edited by Tim Tomlinson, Lisa Kirchner, and Amy Lemmon, respectively. 

The future is here—and we owe it to all of you who made it happen. Here’s a special thank you to everyone who contributed.

 

Mary Cool, Editor-in-Chief

With: Amy Lemmon, poetry editor; Lisa L. Kirchner, memoirs editor; Jacqueline Bishop, art gallery editor; Tim Tomlinson, fiction editor; and Voichita Nachescu, essays editor.

 

Table of Contents
My Grandmother Was an Artist
A discussion with Jacqueline Bishop, the winner of the 2016 nonfiction Bocas Prize, about art, feminism, and the state of Caribbean literature.
Dickson Schneider
California artist Schneider critiques values and the art world in his pointed works
Endings
It’s not about a cat. My relationship with my cat was civil. She didn’t like people; she only liked me.
Snowfall
They were African American women who were on fire, and most of the world craved their heat.
Prose Poems with Placemats
No more than dancer from dance, art from life, can you tell the placemat from the supper.
Got a Face
My phone goes off. It’s a text. The first response to my ad today: “Nice pic. Got a face?”
Mother-Son-Hood
. . .every time a plane flew over, Dai would go out to the yard, jump up and down in time to “Mommy, Mommy, Mommy . . .”, head held high up, hands reaching upward.
Someplace Between Respect and Desire
I was the woman and he was the man, I was Asian and he was white, I was just another local girl and he was the dashing coveted foreigner. . . .
Paris Haunts
You see, I have put George there entering an apartment building in the posh 16th arrondissement, and all I’m thinking about is his cock.  
That Man in Our Lives: A Novel Excerpt
The art of naming in Chinese is a balance of beauty and meaning.
A Thousand Words
Growing up I thumbed through the pictures often, trying to understand where their love went wrong. Now I wanted to know what they’d done right.
Mara
She dressed all in black, always wearing shitkicker boots with high, thick heels.
My Dinner With Andy
"Oh, please. You're Andy Warhol. Let's have dinner, okay?"
Xantus’s hummingbirds and other bird poems
Or the word for immanence, which I am told is called looking at trees I know because the kid secretly circles in her book
Five poems from “21st Century Dungeons”
This place is very serious.  A lock like that is symbol of seriousness, don’t you think? Grown up serious.
Waiting to taste the first salt; Is empty he says
A pacemaker clocked out her days . . .
5 Poems from “formerly FloodLand”
Yesterday, I did not open the dragon boat race . . .
After He Calls Me A Low-Hanging Fruit; Blackout
I have a dream in which I am staring at the dead branches . . .
Phony Suicide Hotline & Other Poems
At the dissertation defense, the psychology grad student is saying that oxytocin is essential to feelings of social affiliation . . .
Falling, Sometimes; Night Creatures
When I fall asleep rain is hitting the roof, steady as in childhood . . .
First Trumpet Fiction reading of 2016
Join us Saturday, Oct. 8 for a reading featuring fantastic fiction writer Stephen Langlois, and novelists Erika Swyler and Julian Tepper.
Latest works from our editors & authors
Check out upcoming publications and productions from Amy Lemmon, Lisa L. Kirchner, Marcia Butler, and Voichita Nachescu!
We salute you, donors!
Ducts thanks everyone who contributed to our 2016 website redesign!
In A World . . . Where Donald Trump Is President
Lisa L. Kirchner's short play, "In a World . . . Where Donald Trump Is President" debuts in NYC this October at the Midtown International Festival.
Welcome to Ducts 2.0
A look back on our campaign and an update on the highlights of our new site.
October authors exude otherworldly light
Our Trumpet Fiction readers literally shone, as can be evidenced in the otherworldly photographs below from our beloved venue, KGB Lit Bar.
Nov. 12 Trumpet Fiction Reading
Trumpet Fiction reading series Saturday, Nov 12, 7-9 p.m. KGB Bar; ADMISSION FREE; 85 East 4th Street (between 2nd and 3rd Ave)