Dear Readers,
Our tenth issue marks a collision. We’ve compiled print and digital, audio and visual. End of the Day revels in heartache and hope, which seems appropriate right now: the days are shorter; the country’s in upheaval; the world’s expiration date in 2012 lingers. We’ve brought disaster from Laurence Ross, misfits from Sida Li. When a man says “Tell me your trouble, baby” in Catherine Lacey’s story, he asks for all of us. Steven D. Schroeder offers patriotic platitudes turned sideways with tooth decay and ATMs.
It would be easy to put our feet up, claim we’re tired, and call it a day.
But we wouldn’t do that to you. We believe in an end that swoops back around, in reflection after chaos. Which is why we chose works diverse and solemn, smart and jarring for this landmark issue. Big changes have visited the world this year. Big changes are coming to Hot Metal Bridge in the next year. It’s lucky then, that we have digital dynamo Evan Ratliff, Pittsburgh poet Terrance Hayes, and Braddock writer-in-residence Josh Barkan to guide us through the bombed out landscape. Building from the rubble, or perhaps refusing to acknowledge it, they’re focused on what’s new, what’s to come. And so are we.
That’s not to say we’ve left everything behind. Tara Laskowski calls back to rock and roll classics. Wells Tower schools us with a new take on the traditional.
At the end of the day, you decide what form your life, your art takes.
Thanks for reading,
Steve and Robyn
Editors-in-Chief
Steve Gillies
Robyn Jodlowski
Fiction Editors
Jen Howard
Rachel Mangini
Nonfiction Editors
Amanda Giracca
Maria Sholtis
Poetry Editors
Soham Patel
Karen Thimell
Fiction Readers
Meghan Condran
Katie Coyle
April Flynn
Jonathan Gotsick
Erin Lewenauer
Mandy Matson
Tyler McAndrew
Jacob Spears
Travis Straub
Jon VanderWoude
Nonfiction Readers
Nikki Carroll
Laura Clark
Tim Maddocks
Poetry Readers
Laura Brun
John Calvasina
Erin Lewenauer
Lauren Russell
Leigh Thomas
Social Media Editor
Stephanie Wilson
Faculty Advisor
Allison Amend
Banner design by Maria Sholtis
HMB logo by Valdemir Adnial Kollwitz
Wells Tower ‘Zine Art by Michelle Kantor
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