Letter from the Editor

Dear Readers,
There’s nothing quite like the deepest of belly breaths beneath an overcast sky in October. It’s the smell of aging wood and falling in love for me.
I hope you can find sweet refuge on a crisp Saturday morning and open your heart to what is the 23rd issue of Glassworks magazine.
One of our authors, Steven R. Weiner, writes:
“The garden needs to be pruned,
Blooms of no more use to me,
And I have shears.”
’Tis the season for shears, is it not? It’s time to rediscover our truth—our color. It’s time for a reawakening before we prune what’s dead or dying. A sky painted pearl in the fall may be my favorite, but the world is desperate for color. Color in our cheeks, our eyes, our souls, our bones. Don’t you think? We must find what matters most! And the rest? We let it go, or as the Beatles would say, we let it be.
Until it’s time to grow again.
There’s nothing quite like the deepest of belly breaths beneath an overcast sky in October. It’s the smell of aging wood and falling in love for me.
I hope you can find sweet refuge on a crisp Saturday morning and open your heart to what is the 23rd issue of Glassworks magazine.
One of our authors, Steven R. Weiner, writes:
“The garden needs to be pruned,
Blooms of no more use to me,
And I have shears.”
’Tis the season for shears, is it not? It’s time to rediscover our truth—our color. It’s time for a reawakening before we prune what’s dead or dying. A sky painted pearl in the fall may be my favorite, but the world is desperate for color. Color in our cheeks, our eyes, our souls, our bones. Don’t you think? We must find what matters most! And the rest? We let it go, or as the Beatles would say, we let it be.
Until it’s time to grow again.

This issue is full of intricate reminders of why we should cherish our extraordinarily fleeting existence together. It highlights the complex human experiences of leaving and returning home, satiating our desires, and quietly allowing suffering—ours and our loved ones’—to take hold, manifesting graciously into wisdom and empathy.
Poetry drives the intensity of this issue, filtering fiction and nonfiction works in between, all of which are devastatingly enchanting. The works of those such as Phillip Watts Brown, Edytta Wojnar and Ron Riekki will recalibrate your senses while the artwork emboldens every turn of the page.
The scene behind the curtain of Glassworks has been wild and ever-changing, yet seamlessly managed to bring color into your lives—our readers. This is the second issue of Glassworks I have been lucky enough to contribute to, but it is the first I’ve seen from start to finish. I’ve loved the opportunity to engage with you all through our social media platforms, but my role as an Associate Editor has been nothing in comparison to that of Katie Budris, Glassworks’ sensational Editor in Chief.
Thank you, Katie, for your trust, patience, and mentoring. Thank you to my friend and former Associate Editor Amanda Rennie for subtly pushing me beyond the edges of my comfort zone. It has been a privilege to be a small part of the team that puts something so inherently good into the hands of fellow creatives.
I invite you to let Glassworks’ Issue 23 bring color back into your world and inspire a pruning of anything left that doesn’t suit the inevitable blooming of you.
Megan Kiger
Associate Editor
Poetry drives the intensity of this issue, filtering fiction and nonfiction works in between, all of which are devastatingly enchanting. The works of those such as Phillip Watts Brown, Edytta Wojnar and Ron Riekki will recalibrate your senses while the artwork emboldens every turn of the page.
The scene behind the curtain of Glassworks has been wild and ever-changing, yet seamlessly managed to bring color into your lives—our readers. This is the second issue of Glassworks I have been lucky enough to contribute to, but it is the first I’ve seen from start to finish. I’ve loved the opportunity to engage with you all through our social media platforms, but my role as an Associate Editor has been nothing in comparison to that of Katie Budris, Glassworks’ sensational Editor in Chief.
Thank you, Katie, for your trust, patience, and mentoring. Thank you to my friend and former Associate Editor Amanda Rennie for subtly pushing me beyond the edges of my comfort zone. It has been a privilege to be a small part of the team that puts something so inherently good into the hands of fellow creatives.
I invite you to let Glassworks’ Issue 23 bring color back into your world and inspire a pruning of anything left that doesn’t suit the inevitable blooming of you.
Megan Kiger
Associate Editor