Like the bleary-eyed bear on the cover of this issue, we are waking up from hibernation—a twenty-year hibernation, to be exact.
Shō’s revival was set in motion by our return to the United States two years ago. After spending ten-odd years in Southeast Asia, where we met, we moved to North-Central Arizona, which we now call home. A return to our poetry practices followed. We began sending out our work to literary magazines, making connections with other poets, and somewhere in the process, we began to wonder how Shō would fare in the current literary landscape.
Much has changed since Shō No. 2 was published in 2003. Submittable has taken over duties from the U.S. Postal Service. Many long-established journals have folded or moved online. Some have become hybrids, publishing both online and in print. Hundreds of independent journals have sprung up, some of which respond in less than a week (one of our contributors clocked a rejection at five minutes!)
Perhaps the most surprising development, though, is that MFA programs have become much more democratic and diverse, and the journals being produced by these programs—and in many cases, their mastheads— reflect that sea change. At the same time, more poets are building and extending community and support structures for other poets outside of academia. We believe poetry is undergoing a revolution and a renaissance, and we are heartened by its widening arms.
It took firsthand experience for us to begin envisioning how we, in our current incarnation of Shō, might hold a space for poets today. It is a question we continue to contemplate in our capacity as poets and as editors of a small-press print journal. Despite the opportunities afforded by electronic publishing, we wouldn’t be reviving Shō without the means to produce a print issue: as readers, we find we connect more deeply with books we hold in our hands.
Going forward, we plan to publish Shō biannually. In addition to resurrecting the journal, we are launching the first book in our new Beggar Poet Series. The Art of Mercy: New and Selected Poems by Robert L. Penick, whose poems appear in Shō Number 2 and 3, will be released
in October 2023. For more information, turn to the last spread in this issue. We plan to publish the second and third books in this series in Fall 2024 and Spring 2025. We will announce calls for manuscript submissions on our website and social media channels.
Finally, Shō’s revival would not be happening if not for the trust of our contributors and for your support, dear reader. We hope this issue leads you to discover new voices. We hope you will buy their books!
Johnny Cordova & Dominique Ahkong
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In memory of the poets featured in Shō Number 2 who have passed on:
David Church
Michael Hemmingson
Zyskandar A. Jaimot
Lyn Lifshin
Gerald Locklin
Lee Lozowick
Louis McKee
Anne Menebroker
Todd Moore
William Packard
Jim Simmerman