Floodwall Magazine
At Floodwall, we believe that creative writing can bring people together and challenge us to see the world in new and different ways. In 2012, a group of graduate students in the English Department started Floodwall Vol. 1. They published five issues of fiction and poetry by incredibly talented writers as well as interviews with world famous authors. The amount of work these students did to bring the magazine to life was enormous, and they kept it going for as long as they were at UND.
We don't want to lose what they did - so after some years of inactivity, we've sprayed down "the wall" and revamped it with an eye toward our students. Creative writing is still at the center of Floodwall's mission, but in order to foster a literary community on our campus, we think it's important to share the work being done right here at UND. Floodwall has always been collaborative, and UND’s writers, artists, and editors will continue to build this literary tradition together, brick by brick, piece by piece. Now in its second iteration, in an effort to showcase a variety of creative works from all members of our student body, Floodwall Vol. 2 publishes fiction, poetry, nonfiction, photography, and digital art made by students at The University of North Dakota.
For most recent updates please see the live Floodwall Magazine website.
Current Issue: Volume 2, Issue 10 (2024) Fall 2024
Introduction
We’re thrilled to reveal volume two, issue ten of Floodwall, the University of North Dakota’s student-run literary magazine! Somehow December is upon us, though we’re not quite sure where the time went. Despite the seemingly instantaneous jump to Floodwall 2.10’s launch, we could not be more grateful for the incredible student, faculty, and staff support we’ve seen. Floodwall’s reputation as a community-first magazine representative of the current UND student body is one that both precedes its name and embodies it; without the unwavering support of our contributors, volunteers, and readers, Floodwall would not be Floodwall. This issue continues to reveal its support beam by beam, brick by brick, the closer we look. At the center of it all is you, dear reader. Thank you for being here.
In something of a change from last semester’s issue, we’ve had a cautiously precedented semester here at Floodwall. We’ve grown our team to include a second co-advisor, Dr. Courtney Kersten, and her dedication and respect for the home we have in Floodwall is inspiring. We’ve also watched our creative submissions explore different mediums, formats, and content. But perhaps most importantly, we’ve borne witness to our contributors’ most vulnerable conversations, emotions, and ideas. With each intimate submission, our community—our flood wall—grows stronger and more resilient.
As we move toward a winter break projected to be ice-cold, we hope you’ll spend a bit of time on our newest issue. On the cover, Robert Moore Jr.’s out-of-this-world image “IC434 Total Sum,” from the Nights Alone in the Cold and Dark art and photography collection, portrays the inspiringly vast and ethereal colors and sounds of space. With each individual star, lightyears away, Moore’s image replaces fear and unmasks the comfort in insignificance and the unknown. As you turn the page, you’ll explore it all—known and unknown, love and mystery, pain and beauty. The importance of found family, and the complicated agony of blood. Multiple autobiographies as they twist and dance with one another. Love and loss and their permanent contract. Hand-crafted lineages and their magic, power, and life.
As always, it’s a gift to hold these stories for our contributors in every format—fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry, and art and photography. We’re honored to bear their trust, and for the dedication of our volunteer team members who worked tirelessly to develop this issue. And our deepest thanks to you, reader, for joining us in this ever-changing, unending, and unknown world to find comfort in the insignificance—to find comfort in each other, in the significance we’ve created. Thank you.
We hope you’ll join us in celebrating the Floodwall team on the masthead for this issue. There, you’ll find the names of our co-advisors, section editors, volunteer readers, chief copyeditors, copyeditors, layout and design workers, and proofreaders. We’re so grateful to have found a family in our team. They deserve the world.
Fiction
Coffee Shop Masquerade
Nauman Farid
Product Review: Self Reflection
Veronika Linstrom
Mourning, as Expressed in Dancing
Maren Schettler
Poetry
The Jonah Complex
Jonah Stroup
The Laws of Time Travel
Drake Carnes
The Weeping Willow
Korbyan Chavez
Watching the Whispers in the Grass
Cadence Gray
You Know Where to Find Me, and I Know Where to Look
Veronika Linstrom
Where the wild things are
Abigail Petersen
Junkite Street
Chloe Piekkola
Working Man
Brenden Kimpe
Words of Power
Brenden Kimpe
Falling or Flying?
J.G. Grev
Blocking, Enacted, to Avoid Burns of the Fourth Degree
Jameson Buckau
If You Turn My Body to Stone
Colin Borgen
Through Spare
Casey Fuller
Hologram Tupac 2012
Casey Fuller
This Pencil
Casey Fuller
Nonfiction
The Alternate Bios
Casey Fuller
When I Was Five
Ceallan Hunter
Photography
Artist’s Statement
Rachel Jones
Smoke on the Water
Rachel Jones
Morning Fast
Rachel Jones
Artist’s Statement
Robert Moore Jr.
IC434 Total Sum
Robert Moore Jr.
Artist’s Statement
Jalen DeCoteau
Grand Entry
Jalen DeCoteau