Fall 2011
Dear Readers:
The drooping leaves on my neighbor’s persimmon tree are already starting to turn yellow. Soon they will deepen into a reddish-purple and fall to the ground, leaving beautiful orange globes of persimmons hanging on the bare branches.
I think of autumn as a time of beginning. It’s the result of all those childhood years of starting a new grade in September, and seeing my children and grandchildren do the same. And I celebrate Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, at this time, and that makes me conscious of beginning again.
There’s a bustle in the air, a certain purposefulness that descends after the summer’s heat. I come more to life in the fall—funny, because it’s a time of things starting to shrivel and die. I make more plans, organize more activities, consider more carefully what has gone before and what I want to do in the future.
At Persimmon Tree, we’ve been doing a lot of looking back over the past five (!!) years and planning ahead for the future. There are many changes coming—you’ll hear about them in a few months—and they will be important for us. But we’ll continue doing what we do best: publish emerging and established women writers, poets, and artists over sixty. It’s a worthy mission and we’re proud of it.
But as always, we need your help in continuing our work.
In November you will begin to receive emails from us, asking you to contribute to our yearly fundraising drive. We depend greatly on the money we bring in at this time. Please help us out—Persimmon Tree cannot continue without your support and generosity.
Another way you can support us is by passing the word about the magazine to people you know. Those of you on Facebook and Twitter—and there are more of you in 2011 than there were when we started the magazine—can increase our readership by posting news about the latest issue of the magazine. Every time somebody does that, our numbers zoom up.
We think you’ll really appreciate this issue of the magazine with the section honoring Esther Broner, the fine fiction and nonfiction, the many excellent poems, and the lovely art. Please do share the word about it with everyone around you.
We wish you a good autumn season,