Dear Readers,

When we launched Waterwheel Review, we were keen to explain why we were so moved and motivated by the image of the waterwheel. Water stands for language, an ever flowing, renewable source; the waterwheel, an engine of labor, circles through, lifting words and then dropping them back into the running stream. Our magazine is a mill, we said, where the waterwheel powers writing and publishing. “We want—and need—to make things.”

For a couple of years, now, we have known that we can’t make enough of our own things while we give so much energy to the work of others. We have had to cut substantially the time and attention devoted to our own writing, and mostly we have been glad to do it, determined to find a way to repay our own work in the end. We never did find that way.

If we could quit our jobs and earn that income publishing this magazine, we would take that deal in an instant. But that’s not the world we live in. For many, many months we have known this, but we couldn’t accept it until now. And thank goodness for that.

Every single issue of this magazine has been a wonder that transported and enchanted us. We can’t say we gloried in every moment. We read or edited or built the site at times while sick, exhausted, grieving—that’s the nature of any publication. But we damn well gloried in every word, every paired image and sound.

Four years and thirty-six issues: What an honor to publish our contributors. What a privilege to offer stunning work to our readers. We must use the word pleasure, too, always rolled out to accompany “honor and privilege,” but pleasure isn’t strong enough, nor is gratitude nor joy nor blessing. For once we find ourselves at a loss for words to express precisely what it has meant to keep this waterwheel turning.

Maybe this will do it: How many times does anyone ever fully achieve the glittering, half-glimpsed vision floating above; that winking, flirting piece of art we ache to manifest? For the three of us, precisely this once.

We will keep making things and so will you. We started this magazine with the image of the waterwheel and a Jean Rhys quote, and we will end in the same way, as we thank you for reading and submitting, and wish you and yours all the very best:

Listen to me. All of writing is a huge lake. There are great rivers that feed the lake, like Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. And there are mere trickles, like Jean Rhys. All that matters is feeding the lake. I don’t matter. The lake matters. You must keep feeding the lake.

—Claire, Suzanne, Cheryl

September 1, 2024: Waterwheel Review will stay online for the foreseeable future. It remains as it looked for the final June 2024 issue.

Archives

May 2021 | Issue #9

triptych for Alams for Cleaning Out the Painter's House — “Alams for Cleaning Out the Painter’s House” by Charlotte Friedman

triptych for Snake Fence — “Snake Fence” by Tamara Best

triptych for While Looking for Eating Utencils in my Uncle's Kitchen — “While Looking for Eating Utensils in My Uncle’s Kitchen” by Lisa Creech Bledsoe

We write to taste life twice, in the moment and in retrospection. —Anaïs Nin

Editor’s Note
Makers

April 2021 | Issue #8

“Where Love Will Need No Proof” by Kitty Jospé

“After You’ve Saved a Life” by Jonie McIntire

“A Brief History of Blue” by Dawn Denham

The line of words fingers your own heart. It invades arteries, and enters the heart on a flood of breath; it presses the moving rims of thick valves; it palpates the dark muscle strong as horses, feeling for something, it knows not what. —Annie Dillard

Editor’s Note
Makers

March 2021 | Issue #7

triptych for The Shut In — “The Shut-In” by Erica Kent

triptych for Reduction — “Reduction” by Danielle Joffe

“My New York Accent” by Anne Myles

My sufferings are part of my self and my art. —Edvard Munch

Editor’s Note
Makers

February 2021 | Issue #6

“A Little Watershed” by Bill Vernon

“There’s Something a Little Wrong with Everything” by CG Miller

“The Night Janet Brought Her Rhymer Home” by Stephanie Friedman

There is just no escaping the fact that there is a tight relationship between the words we use, the type of thoughts we can think, and what we can believe to be true about the world. —Sam Harris

Editor’s Note
Makers

January 2021 | Issue #5

“The Beach Bum and the Midwestern Freshman” by Zebulon Huset

“The Mass of Invisible Labors” by Sarah Twombly

“Sink or Swim” by Heather Diamond

Above all, don’t forget. Commit everything – each blade of grass, each teary-eyed child, each unmarked grave – to memory. Then when you survive and are older, tell your story. —Andrew Lam

Editor’s Note
Makers

December 2020 | Issue #4

“Avian Elegies” by Shannon Bowring

image triptych for A Thing of Beauty — “A Thing of Beauty” by Nancy Jorgensen

triptych for oil spill — “oil spill” by Liam Strong

I think the whole glory of writing lies in the fact that it forces us out of ourselves and into the lives of others. —Sherwood Anderson

Editor’s Note
Makers

November 2020 | Issue #3

original triptych for "coralling" — “Corralling” by Mary Warren Foulk

original triptych for "wish" — “Wish” by W.A. Schwartz

original triptych of "the family dollar" — “The Family Dollar” by Catherine Schmitt

All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us. —J.R.R. Tolkien

Editor’s Note
Makers
“Sickly Sweet Companion”

October 2020 | Issue #2

Pioggia triptych — “Pioggia” by JC Reilly

Jumpers triptych — “Jumpers” by Seth Jani

ballad of tribades triptych — “ballad of tribades / song of sodomites” by Hazelle Lerum

Writing is a form of prayer. —Franz Kafka

Editor’s Note
Makers

September 2020 | Issue #1

“Forgive the Form” by Christina Rauh Fishburne

“Three Women Writing Around My Head” by Jefferson Navicky

“We Have Always Been Who We Are” by Sofia T. Romero

Listen to me. All of writing is a huge lake. There are great rivers that feed the lake, like Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. And there are mere trickles, like Jean Rhys. All that matters is feeding the lake. I don’t matter. The lake matters. You must keep feeding the lake. —Jean Rhys

Editor’s Note
Makers
Author Q&A with Jefferson Navicky

February 2020 – Sample Issue

triptych for "only now" — “Only Now” by Suzanne Farrell Smith

triptych image for "skinner's wife's box" — “Skinner’s Wife’s Box” by Claire Guyton

“In Its Distance” by Cheryl Wilder

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