From the Editor: The Allegro Issue
Allegro: thrumming-racing-songbird feeling. The music in a fever dream, skip-stumbling pulse, breath searing so sharp it feels nearly soft.
And now: this, and this, and this.
It has been one long year since I took a deep breath and clicked publish on our first website. And here is the start. A picture of disassembly and of weaving together once more—as a losing, but also as a finding. The pieces featured in Half Mystic’s inaugural issue are a long year in the making: the product of countless sleepless nights, endless jangling conversations, melody pushing forward into bone and marrow.
I have learned in curating this collection, in listening to the authors spin their whole old truths, that allegro at its core will always be a work-in- progress. The sprinting never quite ends. Each and every piece in this issue resonates in fleeting; each is a symphony glowing with movement.
Dear reader, Half Mystic’s Issue I: Allegro is a story of running away from something beautiful but towards something real.
I have learned in the making of this issue that perhaps the thing we find in the escape is not home. But something close, at least. Encapsulated in these pieces—some pulsing song. Some fistful of naked magic.
You cannot capture it—but do not flee from it. You know that it has always been yours.
Half Mystic's inaugural issue is out now: the product of laughter, tears, and enormous hard work on the part of editors & contributors alike. Featuring creators such as Lydia Havens, Dalton Day, Scherezade Siobhan, and more, it is a stunning compilation of contemporary art, lyrics, and writing in celebration of music in all of its forms.