Welcome to the 40th issue of Ducts!
A lot has happened in our world in the last six months, and as always, you’ll find unique and personal takes on it all here—including some pieces that speak to the themes of abuse of personal power and the stories of those who resist.
This issue also includes the debut of poetry editor, Precious Okoyomon, and the photography of guest arts editor, Peter Ahn, who personally selected images for our five feature pieces from his diverse film archive. You can read more about his art and selection process here.
You can also hear some of this issue’s selections at our winter issue launch reading, which will take place in New York City on January 13, 2018.
Finally, we thank the Community of Literary Magazines and Presses (clmp), for their support of this issue in the form of a 2017 New York Technical Assistance Program regrant provided by the New York State Council on the Arts.
MASTHEAD
Mary Cool
Editor-in-Chief
mary@ducts.org
Voichita Nachescu
Essays Editor
voichita@ducts.org
Julie Wilkerson
Fiction Editor
julie@ducts.org
Peter Ahn
Guest Arts Editor
Lisa L. Kirchner
Memoirs Editor
lisa@ducts.org
Precious Okoyomon
Poetry Editor
poetry@ducts.org
Table of Contents
Memoirists Nancy Hightower, Dorri Olds, Lisa L. Kirchner, Charles Sanchez, Dean Wrzeszcz
Saturday, Jan. 13, 2018, 7-9 pm
Ducts welcomes Peter Ahn, guest arts editor, to our Winter 2018 issue--see his photographs in our 5 feature pieces.
This high school teacher then touched my daughter’s hand, the small of her back, her soul.
A struggling actress in between auditions, I was grabbing a hotdog at Gray’s Papaya on West Seventy-second in Manhattan when David Gilbert recognized me.
I saw the world, but not by choice.
Vaguely, he felt that “times” were good or bad or somewhere in between, but his own life had no such flows and eddies.
Hosted by Voichita Nachescu: Sat, Feb 10, 7-9 pm
Authors Nolan Janssens, Carol Schlanger, K-B Gressitt & D Ferrara, and performers Ken Simon, Alix Alias, and Mary Cool
Stores about the nature of losing: Sat, Mar 10, 7-9 pm
Hosted by Mary Cool: Sat, May 12, 7-9 pm
With authors Beth Ann Bauman, Emilie Cohen, Mary Cool, and Regan Fad.
One unshakable truth is that home is where the body has been.
I pull on my shoes and jacket and reach to unlatch the front door of our houseboat. Loud screams stop me in my tracks.
I was certain I was on my way to greatness or at least to a unique place in the history of modern players.
The dining room disappeared. That’s what happens when your brain doesn’t want to acknowledge the world anymore, when something is presented to you that you just can’t look at yet, let alone name.
I struggle to swallow as I read cancer articles, the tenderness in my throat increasing with each one.
It's true that I got my first period at the Freud museum