The turn of the year is a time of giving throughout the world, as millions of us celebrate according to our various traditions, gathering with family members, exchanging presents, and making well wishes to loved ones near and far. So it is an appropriate hour now to think about the lifeblood of our planet—and to give thanks for all that the oceans of the Earth have laid upon our table, feeding our imagination as well as our bodies.

Indeed, the gifts of the sea are without number.

Sunny sand castles and snowy-sloped dunes. Wharves in their briny harbors. Otters and penguins. Lighthouses and their keepers. Islands and tides. Even foggy childhood memories of our mothers the sea may grant us from her fathomless repository.

Open these pages and you’ll find all those gifts and more. We invite you, dear reader, to celebrate that bounty with the writers and photographers in the Hibernal ’08 issue of Sea Stories.

Come aboard and meet a galley wench with Pauline Michel; go on night watch with Katrina Hays. Break bread—blueberry gingerbread—with the Chocoe Indian crew of the Panamanian ketch Pajaro Jai in Patricia Smith Ranzoni’s poem.

From Rhossili in Wales to Algarrobo, Chile, to stateside along the beaches of St. Augustine, Kitty Hawk, and Sandy Hook … Sea Stories will take you there on a far-ranging literary and artistic expedition. Do, please, join us.

When it comes to the sea, as David Radovich reminds us, “There is no end to horizon.” Emily Scudder said it well: All you have to do is “Keep your mind on space and light.”

KLM

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