Editor's Note

Echo Railton's wonderful "Dandelion" on Issue 53's cover captures the fragility of beginnings and the value of resilience, both of which the Cortland Review staff know something about as we look forward to and celebrate our 15th year of continuous publication of the best poetry and fiction written today.

Ms. Railton, with a B.F.A from Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, Halifax, NS Canada, teaches foundations drawing at Florida State University, Tallahassee, where she is currently an M.F.A. candidate. "Dandelion" is only a small part of her larger work, "Taraxacum Officionale" (the Dandelion's Latin name), "the plant," she says, "against which we wage war on our lawns," ignorant, it would seem, of its "numerous benefits for the liver, kidneys, and urinary tract to name just a few." The larger "Taraxacum Officionale," seen here, examines the weed from its beginnings as a pollen granule to its mature form, an overrun field and back again," a blossoming from the mere wisp of a beginning.

Cortland Review looks forward to celebrating its own beginning and blossoming at our 15th anniversary reading at the AWP Conference (February 29th to March 3) in Chicago, with distinguished voices from our last five years: Claudia Emerson, Thomas Lux, Jamaal May and Glenis Redmond. Please come by to hear these amazing poets and wish us another 15 years.

Scheduled Day: Saturday, March 3
Scheduled Time: 10:30 AM to 11:45 AM
Scheduled Room, Hotel, Floor: Wiliford A, Hilton Chicago, 3rd Floor