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.

Waterwheel Review

Literature Without Labels

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Editor’s Notebook: On Birds

Editor’s Notebook: On Birds

February 2024

dark reds orange, yellow of a sunrise over rooftops and power lines with silhouettes of birds in flight

I have a new toy, something I’ve wanted ever since moving to a valley in the woods: a wildlife camera, this one trained specifically on birds. Bamboo box with two vertical seed channels, extended perch, and recessed, solar-powered camera. It promises to “blend into nature.” 

Each morning, my young sons and I open the app to view who’s visiting (a male Northern Cardinal usually arrives just before sunrise). Each afternoon, we look through the moments captured and recorded throughout the day, laughing at how mourning doves squabble. Each evening, we personify: the red-bellied woodpecker looks so satisfied with himself; that tufted titmouse is clearly thanking us for the refill; our Carolina wren is braving her shyness to enjoy scrumptious sunflower seeds. We learn from the birds something about ourselves: the songbird seems timid, yet he dives in. When do we hesitate? How might we take flight? What’s the reward? 

By bedtime, of course, I remind myself that the birds are birds, doing what they’ve done for ages longer than we’ve been here. What lesson should we—readers, writers, humans navigating the natural and unnatural world—take with us, without asking birds to be teacher? 

I was struck by how birds play a role in all three of our February pieces, teaching from a distance. Each blends into nature. Seemed a sign of a sort, that just as my backyard friends were rendered close and clear, writing appeared that is equally close and clear. I wanted that connection. I believed I willed it into being.

Gretel Ehrlich says to look at nature as an invitation to be what we are: I wonder if what we are, as humans and at heart, in the end and always, is hungry.

—Suzanne Farrell Smith

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From the Editors | Issue #32

January 2024

From the Editors

To begin, begin. — William Wordsworth

screenshot of editors on Zoom call

At Waterwheel Review we’re celebrating not just what’s new in January 2024 but what’s new again. We built Issue 32 from old loves, selecting previously published Waterwheel pieces that speak to a guiding quote. Who better for such a project than Wordsworth, and what better advice, for writers, than his simple, “To begin, begin.” Of course that emphasis on beginning brought back our first kiss—the very first piece we accepted, “Forgive the Form,” by Christina Rauh Fishburne. How lucky that Fishburne’s prose speaks so clearly to beginning and renewal by emphasizing the need to move past anything that holds us in place. As does Christina Hutchins’s “Traveling through the Vanishing Point,” and CG Miller’s “There’s Something a Little Wrong with Everything.” Don’t let yourself get stuck in fear or self-doubt or alienation or delusion, these pieces warn. Don’t let yourself get stuck, full stop. Begin.

—Claire, Suzanne, Cheryl 

Join Our Growing Community

We’re in our fourth season here at Waterwheel Review, and we couldn’t be happier. But we have big dreams. Right now we have two ways—in addition to being an author or maker—to be a part of our labor of love.

1. Sign up for our newsletter.

You’ll know when each issue goes live and learn news about WWR and our authors.

*We promise never to sell or share your information. We hate spam as much as you do. For more info, read our full Privacy Policy.

2. Support literature without labels.

All expenses are out of pocket. Any help goes to our submissions manager and media. We would LOVE to one day pay authors, hold contests, speak at conferences… (slow down, deep breath). Thank you for supporting literature and art!

Support WWR

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From the Editors | Issue #29

October 2023

From the Editors

All the scars on my body, all the bumps and bruises, all the muscles – that is a story of everything I have done. —Rose Namajunas

Editors Cheryl Wilder, Suzanne Farrell Smith, and Claire Guyton

The story of everything we have done is contained, yes, in our bodies. In our work, too; sliced or pruned or distilled as necessary to power the engine of a given piece. “No takebacks” in this life, says Karly Vance in “Supplication,” where we are all the playthings of “helpless, hapless gods.” No takebacks, so let’s get it right, at least the work. In “Your Ancestors I Found Online,” Laurinda Lind provides running, sardonic commentary on notes from a family tree—poor William, 1624, that’s all I’m saying. So everything we have done is contained in our bodies and in our work… and maybe everything our forebears have done, too? In “Some Chance for Precipitation” DB Jonas tells us “We are falling.” Some days we agree; we are all falling, and we wonder if the parachutes will save us. Most days we feel the ground under our feet and we’re grateful for these fragile, scarred bodies, and aging muscles. For everything we’ve done and made.

—Claire, Suzanne, Cheryl 

Join Our Growing Community

We’re in our fourth season here at Waterwheel Review, and we couldn’t be happier. But we have big dreams. Right now we have two ways—in addition to being an author or maker—to be a part of our labor of love.

1. Sign up for our newsletter.

You’ll know when each issue goes live and learn news about WWR and our authors.

*We promise never to sell or share your information. We hate spam as much as you do. For more info, read our full Privacy Policy.

2. Support literature without labels.

All expenses are out of pocket. Any help goes to our submissions manager and media. We would LOVE to one day pay authors, hold contests, speak at conferences… (slow down, deep breath). Thank you for supporting literature and art!

Support WWR

By

Editor’s Notebook: We Are Who We Are

Editor’s Notebook: We Are Who We Are

September 2023

close up: the edge of a small spillway with calm water on top dropping over in a curtain of water sparkling in the sun

Readers, we considered sharing our “What did you do over summer vacation?” tales as a means to peek behind the curtain: What do magazine editors do when they’re not magazine editing? How and when do they write? Importantly, do they write at all?

We came up with this: &$#! (one of us navigating a medical emergency); %*^@ (one of us taking care of kids who got sick their first week of school); and what-the-actual-f? (one of us unable to send her kids back to school because of mold. MOLD.).

We are three WWR editors excited by and honored to publish stunning writing. Somehow, we hear the writing and associate it with images and sounds. We read music, echo voices, and project ideas. Despite and within our own trials, we continue to celebrate what flows by, no matter its form. But, we’re human—vulnerable and fierce—and because life is life, we must pivot to keep moving forward, like water.

—Suzanne Farrell Smith