Fall 2025 marks our 22nd issue since launch­ing in Fall 2013. 

In Fall 2013, the US gov­ern­ment shut down for over two weeks due to dis­agree­ments over the Afford­able Care Act, New Jer­sey became the four­teenth state to legal­ize same-sex mar­riage, and in a few short months Bey­on­cé would release her sur­prise album which bore her name. 

I was a mid­dling high school junior fail­ing alge­bra (pre-alge­bra?), and googling “best ways to rewrite Spar­kNotes” for Eng­lish class. It would be five more years until I stum­bled Kaveh Akbar’s poem “I try not to think of God as a debt to luck, but for years I con­sumed noth­ing / that did not harm me / and still I lived, wit­less // as a bird fly­ing over state lines.” Lines that felt like they were speak­ing about me, to me, and for me like a mir­ror demand­ing change. 

*

Since I took over as EIC of The Account in Fall 2022, some­times there have been “Notes From the Edi­tor’s Lap­top” and some­times there haven’t. Some­times I’ve found new ways to say Thank you, and oth­er times the moun­tain of excus­es—Too many papers to grade, No one reads that part any­way, The end note just takes away from our con­trib­u­tors’ win—the battle. 

I throw in the tow­el and admit there are no new ways to thank you, read­er; no new ways to say thank you, writer, for say­ing no to the din­ner par­ties and min­ing the space between won­der and audi­ence. I’ve already apol­o­gized too many times to our won­der­ful edi­tors for the ram­bling emails and for all the things I thought I men­tioned once or twice but prob­a­bly didn’t.

*

This fall I moved to a new town for the third year in a row: I packed up Can­no­li’s cat tree and water foun­tain and bought new din­ner plates. It’s too hot here, and every­one I love is too far away. At night roach­es fill my sink like it’s a shrine, and out­side there are spi­ders the size of my palm that Can­no­li mis­takes for mice.

*

The sec­ond task of a good edi­tor’s note, after all the thank yous, is to try to say your Why lit­er­a­ture?  What can lit­er­a­ture do? 

In 2023 I said, “(Lit­er­a­ture) offers the read­er a chance to step into the writer’s mind-space while they say Hi. Hel­lo. Wel­come. This is what’s been on my mind.” 

And I still think this is prob­a­bly most­ly true.

*

For months every­thing on my time­line is scary. Smog blows up from the city: Can­no­li chas­es a com­put­er-gen­er­at­ed rat on the TV, and in a while I’ll copy-paste Sor­ry to pester but in a bunch of replies. 

Tomor­row, I’ll end class the same way 

I have for the last six years: by recit­ing a poem.

I don’t know which one it’ll be yet, 

but I know it will be exact­ly what we need.

I hope you will find, are find­ing, have found 

exact­ly what you need in these works. 

I hope through the dull numb­ing light of the blue screen 

you silent­ly think Hey I feel that too.

*

Till Spring, 


Sean Cho A 
EIC