Journal Issue
This December 1925 number of The Lyric West is best met through the writing itself. It contains 18 named pieces or sections, beginning with Vision by Margaret Widdemer, The Dryads by Lilian White Spencer, and Flame by Edith Mirick. That opening offers a direct path through the issue, but it is not the only one. A reader can follow the printed order, pause over a familiar contributor, or start with a title that catches the eye. No special background is needed. The magazine explains itself gradually through the choices it makes and through the company each piece keeps.
Here the break with genteel lyric convention begins in Frances Wierman’s City Rivers. The poem organizes description through sentence-length lines around “A vision of rivers! Turbulent traffic streams”; emphasis shifts through image, enjambment, and changes in syntactic pace, bringing the modern city into the magazine’s field of subjects. Mollie Prager’s Defiance answers it from another angle: it compresses perception into short, image-bearing lines around “How I hate them!”; pause and white space become part of the measure. Short lyrics, longer sequences, and unevenly unfolding free verse share the same contents list, making formal difference part of the issue’s reading rhythm. In Los Angeles, modernism does not erase regional or traditional verse; it puts new pressure on both, asking poets to treat rhythm and perception as unsettled problems.
The contents page also works like a small map. Early entries establish the issue’s first set of voices; around the middle, Hearing Debussy’s “L’Aprés Midi d’un by John Jenkins changes the view; the closing stretch reaches On a Wild Jack-Rabbit by J. Corson Miller. The works differ in length, subject, and manner, yet their placement creates connections that a simple list of names cannot show. The pleasure comes from those changes. A short piece can clear the air after a longer one, a new voice can redirect the mood, and an unexpected title can make an earlier page look different when the reader thinks back to it.
The contributor list includes Margaret Widdemer, Lilian White Spencer, Edith Mirick, Mirza French Mackay, Walter Evans Kidd, David P. Berenberg, Annice Calland, and Virginia Stait, along with 10 additional contributors. Some readers will arrive looking for a particular name; others will meet these contributors here for the first time. Either approach works. The publication details add useful context: the issue was edited by Roy Towner Thompson, published by The Lyric West, and issued from Los Angeles, California. A journal is also a made object, assembled by people deciding what to print, how to order it, and which voices should share a number. Reading from beginning to end lets those choices appear naturally.
The catalog subjects—Los Angeles literary culture, American poetry, Little magazines, Sea and coast, and Love—are useful starting points, especially for searching, but they do not set limits on what a reader may find. For a first visit, begin with Vision by Margaret Widdemer, turn next to Hearing Debussy’s “L’Aprés Midi d’un by John Jenkins, and finish with On a Wild Jack-Rabbit by J. Corson Miller. The clean reading edition is designed for that kind of movement. Original scan: 36 PDF pages. Reader’s edition: 49 PDF pages. It keeps the contents in a stable, legible form and makes names and titles easier to find. A source facsimile remains part of the project’s private editorial record, but it is not included in the public upload. What appears here is the reading copy: a practical way to spend time with the issue and discover which pieces invite a return.
Contributors
- Margaret Widdemer — Poet
- Lilian White Spencer — Poet
- Edith Mirick — Poet
- Mirza French Mackay — Poet
- Walter Evans Kidd — Poet
- David P. Berenberg — Poet
- Annice Calland — Poet
- Virginia Stait — Poet
- Grace Reini — Poet
- John Jenkins — Poet
- Lori Petri — Poet
- Frances Wierman — Poet
- Frances Hull Topping — Poet
- Mollie Prager — Poet
- Joseph Upper — Poet
- Pauline Curran — Poet
- Beulah May — Poet
- J. Corson Miller — Poet
Publication details
Full contents
- Vision — Margaret Widdemer [Poem, p. 65]
- The Dryads — Lilian White Spencer [Poem, p. 66]
- Flame — Edith Mirick [Poem, p. 72]
- Silver — Mirza French Mackay [Poem, p. 73]
- A Sea Diver Speaks to His Inland Love — Walter Evans Kidd [Poem, p. 74]
- The Romantic — David P. Berenberg [Poem, p. 75]
- The Sea at Carrenage — Annice Calland [Poem, p. 75]
- Voices — Virginia Stait [Poem, p. 76]
- In Heaven — Grace Reini [Poem, p. 77]
- Hearing Debussy’s “L’Aprés Midi d’un — John Jenkins [Poem, p. 78]
- A Bookworm Speaks — Lori Petri [Poem, p. 79]
- City Rivers — Frances Wierman [Poem, p. 79]
- From off the Bay — Frances Hull Topping [Poem, p. 80]
- Defiance — Mollie Prager [Poem, p. 81]
- Inhibition — Joseph Upper [Poem, p. 81]
- A Lad of Londonderry — Pauline Curran [Poem, p. 82]
- The Witch Maiden — Beulah May [Poem, p. 83]
- On a Wild Jack-Rabbit — J. Corson Miller [Poem, p. 83]
Rights and citation
Copyright remains with the respective authors, artists, publisher, or successors.
Copyright Status Unresolved
Rights in the individual contributions and the periodical compilation have not been fully resolved.
*The Lyric West*, vol. 5, no. 3, December 1925. Text/Tech Journals, reader’s edition.