Welcome to Issue 7: Dear Friends aka “The Oldies Issue”. Starting today, we begin an experiment of sorts: a short issue comprised of pre-twentieth century poetry. I’d hoped people would submit a poem they love, like, or that should simply just be shared along with a short statement about or response to the poem. Creative responses intrigued me, and I had no idea what I’d get.

I was interested in “deep tracks” more than the “hits,” so the likes of Poe, Dickinson, and Shakespeare would be fine, but I wanted to avoid the high school English textbook standards since I already know them being a non-standard high school English teacher.

From a copyright standpoint, all submissions needed to be in the public domain and out of copyright, which along with a desire to explore lesser known works, led to the pre-twentieth century requirement.

What I got was what I always get from Gnarled Oak contributors… amazing work that inspires. I hope you enjoy reading this issue as much as I enjoyed putting it together, and thank you to all who submitted and made this experiment possible.