The current issue of Poetry is a combined issue, October/November.  It
is number 1, not number 1/2, and, yes, there will, therefore,  be only 5
issues in volume 171, ending with March 1998, number 5.

The publisher (Modern Poetry Ass'n) tells me that they did not give this
issue a double number because of US postal regulations, although the
spokesman could not cite "chapter and verse" of the postal regs.
Several of us in serial-land have heard this argument before, in similar
situations, and it still strikes me as strange.  Our library subscribes
to about 800 periodical titles, far fewer than most of you deal with,
but I see a great many that *do* have combined issue numbers.  Sex
Roles, in fact, gives every issue a double number!

Those of us who are truly obsessive-compulsive will just have to learn
to live with it!  ;-)

Lynne N. Stevens
Lipscomb Library
Randolph-Macon Woman's College
lstevens@rmwc.edu
804 947-8133/FAX 804 947-8134