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41.4 Fall 2018 $5.00

Autumn Migration by F. J. Bergmann Table of Contents 03 Dragons & Rayguns • Vince Gotera 07 SFPA Announcements 15 President’s Message • Bryan Thao Worra 19 From the Small Press • Luke Forney • Rebecca Buchanan • Herb Kauderer 25 Stealth SF: Wouldst Thou Like to Live Deliciously? • Denise Dumars 30 Publishing Speculative Poetry: Rejectomancy and Rejection Rates • Herb Kauderer 42 XenoPoetry: Cebuano Ekphrastic Poetry • Jonel Abellanosa 43 In Memoriam Steve Sneyd • Andrew Darlington Poetry 04 [pinprick] • Roxanne Barbour • Lupus Familiaris • Deborah L. Davitt • [gardens] • Roxanne Barbour • [spawn of earth] • Roxanne Barbour 05 [last Christmas lights] • LeRoy Gorman • [Christmas on Phobos] • LeRoy Gorman • Repairing • Kimberly Nugent 06 Buried in the Lee • Lauren McBride • Robot Scifaiku.1 • Alzo David-West • Days of Prehistoric Futures Past • Robert Borski • Prehistoric Provisions • Beth Cato 08 Advice Columnist Replies to Mrs. Frankensteinsmonstersbride • Sarah Brown Weitzman 09 Spider Star • Josh Pearce • Hail Mary Pass • Benjamin Whitney Norris • [flying through the stars] • Marcus Vance • Ghost Dunes • Ann K. Schwader • [one moon sky] • Deborah P Kolodji 10 After the Seas’ Rise • Deborah L. Davitt • Nearsighted in the Mushroom Cloud • Stephanie M. Wytovich 11 The Marvel of Us • Lisa Timpf • When the Wild West Meets the Frontier • Lisa Timpf 12 The Swarm • Deborah L. Davitt • Louisiana Dragon • Melody Steiner • Maybe Tomorrow • Beth Cato 13 The Warrior Mephala • Christina Sng • How Do They Do That? • Gerri Leen • How to Be Invisible • Mary Soon Lee 14 The Bar-Fly Dilemma • Ken Poyner • [gearing up for Christmas] • Greg Schwartz • What They Took • Mary Soon Lee • [Rice Krispies—] • Susan Burch 15 [brooms burning in the square] • John Reinhart • [fantasy football league] • F. J. Bergmann 16 Misstep • David C. Kopaska-Merkel and Ann K. Schwader 17 Wherefore Art Thou? • Kathleen A. Lawrence • [might be a good time] • Denny E. Marshall • Alien Nursery • Gretchen Tessmer 18 Recent Excavations in Amerika • David Barber • [some] • David C. Kopaska-Merkel 23 Herding Comets • Robert Borski • Lost souls • Matthew Wilson • Hangry • Deborah L. Davitt • boulder moves • Allan Rozinski • [The moon has a big icy blotch,] •Robert Dawson • There was an A.I. from Key West • Robert Dawson 24 Cretaceous Zoo • Gary Every • A Terrible Meat-Eating God • Holly Lyn Walrath 28 Claimant • F. J. Bergmann • [electric savior] • Brian Gene Olson • [cold tentacles] • LeRoy Gorman 29 Date Night • John Grey • Fate • Marge Simon • iSpell • John Reinhart • [dystopic future] • C. William Hinderliter 31 Transformation • Jacob Skillings • Wind Chimes • G. O. Clark • [asteroidinosaurecall] • LeRoy Gorman • [first frost] •F. J. Bergmann 32 [New from the Quantum Physics Book Club:] • Robert Borski • [full autumn moon—] • Susan Burch • Wish You Were Here • David C. Kopaska-Merkel and Kendall Evans • [lost my gun] • Brian Gene Olson • [grandma died last night] • Ngo Binh Anh Khoa 33 [four arms are better] • Marcus Vance • [spaceship window] • Lorraine Schein • Drones & Dragons Disaster • Robert Borski • [time stream convergence] • C. William Hinderliter 34 The Septenary World • Kimberly Nugent • [alien infant clutching tightly] • John Reinhart • The Time Traveler’s Proposal • Phoebe Wagner • Earworm • Benjamin Whitney Norris • [santa sees bright flash] • Denny E. Marshall 35 [growth spurt] • Billy Antonio • A Rondeau on the Televised Launch of the First Rotating Wheel Spaceship • R. Mac Jones • [for the first time] •Billy Antonio • The Space Helmet Hand Dryer Where the Writers Meet • Ian Hunter • unarmed • Justin Short 36 Designated Responsibilites for Spokesparticles • Sandra Lindow • Arthur the King • John C. Mannone • [moonlit sea] • Greg Schwartz 37 [earth’s gravity dies] • Denny E. Marshall • Moon of a far planet • Mark A. McCutcheon 38 (Under)worlds Collide • Mindy Watson • [the alien’s suit] • D. A. Xiaolin Spires • [hid his voodoo doll] • William Landis • Icarus • Benjamin Whitney Norris 39 [time travel retail] • LeRoy Gorman • [autumn bonfire] •F. J. Bergmann • Mining Solo • Lauren McBride [CONTINUED ON FACING PAGE]

Star*Line 2 Fall 2018 Dragons & Rayguns

Dear friends in speculative poetry, greetings! This issue ofStar*Line closes the SFPA’s 40th anniversary. It’s been a marvelous year of poems! Our cover’s whimsical fall fantasia in colored pencil is by previous Star*Line editor F. J. Bergmann, so once again cover art by a poet. We have several interesting forms represented in this issue: an ovillejo chain by Mindy Watson (a centuries-old Spanish form popularized by Cervantes); a terzanelle by Deborah L. Davitt (the terzanelle is a terza rima–based form invented by Lewis Turco); linked cherita by David C. Kopaska-Merkel and Ann K. Schwader (the cherita is a narrative form in 3 stanzas—1 line, 2 lines, then 3 lines—originated by the poet ai li); and also fibs by Lauren McBride and David C. Kopaska-Merkel (in a fib, from line to line the syllable count follows the Fibonacci sequence). Roxanne Barbour gives us a sci(na)ku tanka and a reverse sci(na)ku tanka—a hay(na)ku variation Roxanne invented and premiered in Star*Line a couple of issues back. I neglected earlier this year to thank Mary Chipman, my editorial assistant for issues 41.1 and 41.2 (Winter and Spring 2018). Mary performed this service as my graduate assistant at the University of Northern Iowa. Many thanks for your great work, Mary! Starting with this issue I’m very pleased to have a new editorial assistant, Seth Thill, who is, like Mary, a graduate student in creative writing at UNI. Welcome, Seth! Friends, I hope you enjoy these poems. Why don’t you try out writing an ovillejo or a terzanelle, a cherita or a fib, or a sci(na)ku tanka even! —Vince Gotera, Star*Line Editor

40 wOLF FLOw • Oliver Smith • [whirring of wheels on asphalt] • Lisa Timpf • [two particles] • Marcie Lynn Tentchoff 41 Don’t Step in the Same Reality Twice • Soren James • [the deep vibrato] • Alzo David-West • [black hellebore in Hades’] • F. J. Bergmann • Diana’s Own Black Sky • Kendall Evans • [alien ruins] • Brian Gene Olson • [brain operation] • Denny E. Marshall 42 Pasipala • Jonel Abellanosa • Blasphemy • Jonel Abellanosa Back Cybernetic Harvest • Deborah L. Davitt, Gretchen Tessmer, and D. A. Xiaolin Spires • Legacies • Christina Sng Art

Front Autumn Migration • F. J. Bergmann 14 Halloween Cat • Jade Foo 17 Furry • Denny E. Marshall 29 Fate • Marge Simon 31 Happiest Childhood Memories • Christina Sng 42 Little Animals • John Reinhart

Star*Line 3 Fall 2018 pinprick Lupus Familiaris bubble bursts speed of light She’d taste, he thought, spaceships disgorge like cinnamon, her with tug-of-war her red hair and cloak, like spicy peppers, —Roxanne or some wickedly sharp mint— Barbour her scent teased at him where he paced the shadows of the forest, ghosting over the ground.

The villagers avoided the darkness of the trees, fearing what they might find among them, shadows that moved on their own, gardens spirits that could take flesh on a whim. access denied Space Lords demand He wanted to taste her, to drink her DNA sequencing like the crimson from a sunset, integration stain his throat red with her wine-scent in one long draught, —Roxanne to kneel over her, and discover if poppies Barbour bloomed between her legs, like the roses in her cheeks, and pluck them with his teeth.

But to do so, he had to enflesh himself; he pulled himself in from the shadows, poured himself into a form, the first one he saw, spawn of earth among the denizens of his forest, sleek-eared, spaceship transit sharp-fanged, powerful and clean. insects successful integration He padded to the home of the eldest of her line, other world societies struck a bargain with the crone, in the oldest ways— —Roxanne give me your grandchild, Barbour and I’ll grant you my favor, passage through the moon-gate to the lands beneath the sea, to dance among the fey, for all eternity.

The grandmother took his bargain, traded a grandchild’s life with hardly a thought— and with a flick of power, he tossed her

Star*Line 4 Fall 2018 last Christmas lights sasquatch tracks out of this world, and into another. fill with snow Then he crouched in the shadows of the hut, incorporeal once more, till the girl arrived, —LeRoy Gorman carrying a basket of wheaten cakes, like the ones the villagers had once burned upon his altars.

He swirled around her, smelled her fear; then curled back outside, where he Christmas on Phobos shaped himself there carefully, you eat the green ones first into the semblance of a man. From the door, gingerbread Martians he told her, “Forgive me, but there was a wolf here, —LeRoy Gorman who slew your grandmother, but I’ve slain him in turn. You’re quite safe with me; of this I give you my word.”

She thanked him, weeping, Repairing and he shook with rage inside; her grandmother had assumed he’d take her, on the long line a life paid for a life given. outside the ship “Is there any recompense the lock releases silently that I could offer you?” I remove the broken panel slide the new one in He leaned forward and inhaled a textbook mission the scent of her hair, until the meteoroid nicks tasted her red on his tongue. my air tank “May I go with you, fair maiden? Take me back to your village, leaking introduce me to your kin. I’d like to walk among them, lungs fill slowly if you’ll just let me in.” my breaths shallow panic fades to peace With a smile, she took the huntsman’s hand, but then pain in my arm and led him on their way, a mask hugs my face little knowing that pumping fresh air in the hunter and the hunted were one and the same. being

—Deborah L. Davitt —Kimberly Nugent

Star*Line 5 Fall 2018 Buried in the Lee

In a garden by the sea Robot Scifaiku.1 grows a twisted tree with nets for roots, and fish for leaves; 1. its curse a mystery. Yet locked does the robot feel below, beating still— the positrons flow Dead Man’s Chest in its polycarbon heart? without a 2. key. distant future maternity ward —Lauren McBride a baby robot is born

3. Days of Prehistoric Futures Past lo, what is this thing of calcium and stone Animatronic dinosaurs in my metal hand? replaced by genuine beasts. 4. —Robert Borski awake the robot blinks shining crystal eyes

Prehistoric Provisions —Alzo David-West the show was controversial, sure but the concept couldn't help but draw in millions upon millions of viewers: the best cooks in the country challenged to cook up long-extinct creatures born again through science the first episode had contestants barbecue up mammoth steaks with all the sides soon followed by dinosaur egg soufflés and velociraptor tacos but the episode with the dodo bird was the greatest surprise of all no matter how the chefs prepared the meat it really did taste like chicken

—Beth Cato Star*Line 6 Fall 2018 SFPA Announcements

SFPA Position Open

The SFPA is seeking candidates for the position of Treasurer. The role requires some financial experience and participation in monthly officer’s meetings and weekly discussions. Interested parties should contact the SFPA Secretary. Email [email protected] or contact her via post: Renee Ya, P.O. Box 2074, San Mateo, CA 94401 USA.

Grand Master

We are proud to announce that Ann K. Schwader is our new SFPA Grand Master. 88 members voted. Congratulations, Ann!

Dwarf Star Award Winners

Congratulations to the 2018 Dwarf Star winners! 64 members voted. Many thanks to Dwarf Stars Award Chair and Editor Deborah P Kolodji.

First Place • “The Green” • Kath Abela Wilson (Grass Lyre Press, 2017)

Second Place • “If She Knew She Was a Ghost” • David C. Kopaska-Merkel (Polu Texni, 2017)

Third Place (tie) • “Lo Shu’s Magic Square” • Deborah L. Davitt (Snakeskin 237, 2017) “Lace at the Throat” • Holly Lyn Walrath (SFPA Poetry Contest, 2017)

Elgin Award Winners

The SFPA is proud to announce the 2018 Elgin Award winners! 42 members voted. We are grateful to Award Chair Josh Brown.

CHAPBOOK CATEGORY

First Place • A Catalogue of the Further Suns • F. J. Bergmann (Gold Line Press, 2017)

Second Place • Astropoetry • Christina Sng (Alban Lake, 2017)

Third Place • The Terraformers • Dan Hoy (Third Man Books, 2017)

Star*Line 7 Fall 2018 FULL-LENGTH BOOK CATEGORY First Place • Liberating • Christina M. Rau (Aqueduct Press, 2017)

Second Place • Satan’s Sweethearts • Marge Simon and Mary Turzillo (Weasel Press, 2017)

Third Place • Love Robot • Margaret Rhee (The Operating System, 2017)

Eye to the Telescope

Eye to the Telescope, the SFPA’s quarterly online speculative poetry journal, may be read at eyetothetelescope.com. The October 2018 issue’s theme is Witches, edited by Ashley Dioses. The next theme isCrossroads, with Heather Moser editing. Deadline: December 15. Guidelines available at eyetothetelescope.com/submit.html. Interested in editing an issue of ETTT? See eyetothetelescope.com/editettt.html.

Advice Columnist Replies to Mrs. Frankensteinsmonstersbride

Dear Mrs., I don’t mean to offend but your last name is quite a mouthful. Since you didn’t give a first name I assume it is too. Apparently you are a new bride but claim you knew your hubby only for a few moments. I am not sure of these facts as your spelling and grammar, not to mention your handwriting, are really atrocious.

Was yours an arranged marriage? You said his appearance was a great shock to you. You actually call him a monster. And yet you say you were made for each other so please forgive me if I am confused. I hope you realize that looks fade over the years so physical attraction is not what a happy and lasting marriage should be based upon.

In addition, I am troubled by your seemingly unhealthy attach- ment to your father. As a doctor, he should recognize this as a problem for you both. Also, I think you need to sit down with your mother as soon as possible and have a talk, a very open talk, about what’s called “the facts of life.”

—Sarah Brown Weitzman

Star*Line 8 Fall 2018 Spider Star Hail Mary Pass on their glowing web henpecked of gravity lines for the mission to Rigel dewdrop stars cyborg fowl play (running down the spines) gather constellations Dyson’s superchicken into connect-the-dot in the gravity sling with arachnid silk from spider spinners. —Benjamin Whitney Norris sinners, sketch your skeptic schism into Cancer, an arbitrary blank black space hungry for answers. put your faith in flying through the stars unseen things packed to the brim with soldiers like weak nuclear force arrows of conquest and atomic superpowers captive freethinkers —Marcus Vance or wildflowers as all the worlds vibrate caught in the web of cosmic strings like jewels, like notes picked from a violin insects, struggling in the snare everything spirals around the spider star Ghost Dunes you shout at it, “I was human and for a while, Ghost dunes, the xeno-geos named I was here.” these crescent scars that Martian sand carved in its passing. Wind proclaimed —Josh Pearce its lost direction on the land in pitted arrowheads like hands now pointing nowhere, titans blown to dust. Though scientists demand no more of ghosts, this haunting sown in isolated minds has grown prodigiously. When evening spills across plateaus here, some unknown one moon sky frisson soon rises to a chill an ET can’t sleep, like recognition at first sight counts humans of red dune riders in the night.

—Deborah P Kolodji —Ann K. Schwader

Star*Line 9 Fall 2018 After the Seas’ Rise (terzanelle)

This broken jetty leads to nowhere now, wrapped in misty silence that no voice breaks— the future has no gifts left to endow.

Though I still thirst, this darkened water slakes nothing; these waves burn with a poison brew, wrapped in misty silence that no voice breaks.

The sea swallowed the coast, left towns askew; most folks fled north to cool mountains, leaving nothing—these waves burn with a poison brew.

I hear their ghosts, but that’s just my ears weaving stories for my broken mind; no one’s here. Most folks fled north to cool mountains, leaving everything behind; this city’s my bier. And yet voices in the waves sigh, telling stories to my broken mind. No one’s here!

Not even me—the proof seems compelling. This broken jetty leads to nowhere now, And yet voices in the waves sigh, telling how the future has no gifts left to endow.

—Deborah L. Davitt

Nearsighted in the Mushroom Cloud

When I breathe, the air pierces my lungs, A subtle attack against my attempt to survive, This knife wound in my chest, it pulsates Like a festering wound, the maggots of my infection A reminder that we are nothing but spoiled meat.

I don’t know when it first started, When the outside became poison, a neon tonic To drink down in our gasmask couture, but I cower Amongst the rotted leaves and apple cores, my jean jacket ripped, my gloves, fingerless;

Star*Line 10 Fall 2018 there’s no home to go back to, the world before now a distant memory filled with trivialities like hope.

How did I miss seeing the world die? Was I nearsighted in the mushroom cloud? Blinded by the smoke, the billowing fog That licked me to ash, its tongue a cumulus assault Trailing down my back?

All these little deaths, they come in quiet jabs, The suffocation of cells, the amputations of limbs I wear their marks like collages on my skin, This tableau of pain, a futile assassination attempt To kill something that’s already died.

But there aren’t funerals for girls who still walk, No time for melancholia when your skin is ripped open, A culmination of green pustules swimming in pockmarked flesh; I swallow my teeth sometimes, try to convince myself That my nails are not food, but I bite my cuticles, suck the dirt From my palms, and every morning when the sun doesn’t rise, I pray to Lucifer that whatever Hell he’s building, he Finishes it soon.

—Stephanie M. Wytovich When the Wild West Meets the Next Frontier

The Marvel of Us rustlers running hybrid cattle across ochre prairies roads untrodden, under green-tinged skies possibilities we turn our faces from might not, in the end, laser gunfights wither away like unpicked apples at high noon but rather come to fruition, all of them, in the dim light on some other plane of being of a dying sun sometimes, I imagine heroes riding off, all the possible you’s and me’s triumphant, existing/not existing into the glow on far-off worlds of a twin-star circling unknown suns sunset

—Lisa Timpf —Lisa Timpf

Star*Line 11 Fall 2018 The Swarm (cascade)

Buzzing on a million chitinous wings, my body breaks and fragments, then reforms my eyes are theirs and my mouths are legion— I am the swarm, and I devour all.

I can’t remember how this happened, can’t recall what I was before; my human form seethes as locusts burst from beneath my skin, buzzing on a million chitinous wings,

expands into a cloud, darkening skies, I am a curse, a blight upon your fields, I am the starving death of your first-born— my body breaks and fragments, then reforms.

Do you see me as I stalk ruined rows, a hollow human form, outlined by the hive, an absent presence. I see your fear now— my eyes are theirs and my mouths are legion.

From under the farm’s rich earth, blood rises, the smell of death freights the air with decay. You can run, it’s true, but not far enough— I am the swarm, and I devour all.

—Deborah L. Davitt

Maybe Tomorrow Louisiana Dragon today’s scheduled apocalypse The bayou at high tide: has been cancelled a sleek, silver serpent basking due to unforeseen circumstances on mossy rocks and draped vines. that may include Veiny wings expand, fan deft political maneuvers clouds shaped like crustaceans. assassination His swamp boat body sails concentrated prayers the foaming sky and coils, human sacrifice a python squeezing and intervention his prey. by giant robots

—Melody Steiner —Beth Cato

Star*Line 12 Fall 2018 The Warrior Mephala How Do They Do That?

Mephala kneels before Vampire The statue of Allegra, Creatures of the night Hands clasped like a Buddha, Bloodsuckers supreme Heart serene as a whirlwind. Pale skin, va-va-voom dress And their make-up? It was here Honey, they invented the smoky eye Where she and her king Bowed and exchanged What? Vows of eternity No reflection? Yes, that is a problem Before the goddess Ever tried to do a perfect cat-eye line Of love and fertility With no mirror? All those seasons ago Go ahead, try—I’ll wait When she promised I know Never again to take Can’t do it Another innocent soul, Do they frequent Destroying the warrior in her Cosmetic counters at the mall? For a life of peace and tranquility Boring make-up artists With the same old look Long before The ground opened Natural’s in now And released hell Golden, minimal—no? To her people Right, dark and smoky But don’t you want Massacring the elders To check it out before you go With their demonic magic, In this little mirror? Stealing away the weak To do their bidding. —Gerri Leen

As heaven and earth waits, Mephala casts away her humanity, And clasping her bloodspar Leaves to prepare for war. How to Be Invisible —Christina Sng Shapeshift into a chameleon. Blend in. Purchase an invisibility cloak. Be a woman.

—Mary Soon Lee

Star*Line 13 Fall 2018 The Bar-Fly Dilemma gearing up for Christmas robot elves build The problem robot elves With a holographic lifeform Is that after he buys you —Greg Schwartz A few cheap drinks, talks the serendipitous Weather, then clumsily makes his move— And you tell him, sadly, it will never work out, He makes a few quick internal program changes: And now, damn, it will.

—Ken Poyner What They Took

1st crew to Saturn’s moons, personal cargo. Rice Krispies— the snap crackle pop Caturra coffee beans; of our spaceship battered teddy bear; disengaging air force cross, silver star. from the space station —Eva Alvarez, captain

—Susan Burch , , Dune; blank journals, pens, ink; letters from his sons. —Dmitri Vasiliev

Dice, cards, chess set; épées, mask, fencing uniform; eighteenth century sextant. —Beth Thomas

The Art of War, Five Classics, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy; oversized towel, oolong tea. —Teh Nya Ying

Prayer rug, Quran; épées, mask, fencing uniform; twelve years of birthday candles for Beth. —Karbala’i Samir

—Mary Soon Lee Halloween Cat by Jade Foo (8 yrs old)

Star*Line 14 Fall 2018 President’s Message As we close the final quarter of the 40th anniversary celebrations of the SFPA, we want to thank all of our members who’ve worked above and beyond the call of duty to make this an exceptional year of poetry celebrating the imagination, embracing the fantastic, the horrifying, and the science fictional in their verse. As we go into 2019, there’s already plenty of indication even more great poetry is ahead. I want to take the time to thank all of you who participated in voting for the Dwarf Stars and the Elgin Awards, and we welcome Ann K. Schwader to the select ranks of Grand Master of Speculative Poetry for her decades of contribution to the field. We are also pleased to announce this year’s winners of our 40th anniversary Speculative Poetry Contest in this issue, and we thank our chair Holly Lyn Walrath and our judge John W. Sexton for working to make this one of our biggest years yet. I wish to thank all of my fellow officers and committee chairs, includ- ing our Star*Line editor Vince Gotera and our Eye To The Telescope edi- tors Colleen Anderson, Adele Gardner, Holly Lyn Walrath, and Ashley Dioses for their service, as well as Josh Brown for his services as the 2018 chair of the Elgin Awards, and Deborah P Kolodji for her time as chair of the Dwarf Star Awards. A special thanks also goes to KA Opperman for his time curating our annual Halloween page. As we look back on 40 years, it’s clear there have been many changes to speculative poetry as our membership diversifies around the world. In these times, your creativity is needed now, more than ever. There are so many diverse ways to present our work, whether through books and the internet, bookstore readings or convention appearances. You’ve all been demonstrating the tremendously inventive ways poets can get their words out there, and we are the richer for it. The 2019 Rhysling Award nominations will open up soon, so I hope you’ll take the time now to start thinking about who your nominees will be! Here’s to the next 40 years ahead! —Bryan Thao Worra, SFPA President

brooms burning in the square fantasy football league flying through gray smoke tendrils opposing team lineup: witches on vacuums basilisk, ogre, manticore . . .

—John Reinhart —F. J. Bergmann

Star*Line 15 Fall 2018 Misstep they’re back this year forests do the wave vermilion shoots as if flea bitten burst from the soil the planet twitches we didn’t burn deep enough each epicenter when we cleared the land closer than the last native roots are tough something comes

* * strange feathers blood warm rain beneath each hen we watch the heavens the orb that killed her bruise & darken desperate for protein this thunder a language we never heard our brains lack them hatch a tongue for

* * some women eye-corner motion their bellies swelling I almost shot crave native fruits my brother today ordinary foods we’re all jumpy since are ashes in their mouths the mayor disappeared their sunken eyes her unfired gun

* * corner crack tree shadows at dusk the tiniest vine the ones we never planted finds a way not-trees / not-shadows two days with our lasers closer each evening recovered the structure when we opaque our windows at least some have faces

* *

Star*Line 16 Fall 2018 Wherefore Art Thou? this world is not ours She walked the halls of PS 12 In velvet bodice and crimson sash. native microbes make moves we can’t counter She searched the stage for Romeo Her lover a hundred fortnights back. growths appear on fabric on skin She walked without face or form things fall apart Only air and breeze and scented tears.

* —Kathleen A. Lawrence parasites in flight ancestral vessel might be a good time savaged salvaged savior to remove mold in basement five feet tall with arms native to nowhere wishing on next star —Denny E. Marshall kinder

—David C. Kopaska-Merkel and Ann K. Schwader

Alien Nursery ten fingers, ten toes and one cute button nose are not things you’ll find here instead claws and long tails, fins—fibrous skin-changers, all so lovely so loved by beaming parents glued to the viewing window cooing over every yawn

—Gretchen Tessmer

Furry by Denny E. Marshall

Star*Line 17 Fall 2018 Recent Excavations in Amerika

This is where they lived, memories of their dwellings marked by baked brick in an outline of Euclid. Whether they were happy here we cannot say.

Traces of copper worming through the walls; thought to be a charm to ward off disillusionment. This we understand. Some fragments of vessels

fashioned lovingly from glass the colour of rain, stained with a residue of vines, in those days drunk as proof of success. Now extinct.

A broken blade with lettering in ancient script: STAINLESS had notions of purity and innocence; ST was shorthand for Saint. Their cult spoke endlessly

of sacrifice and blood. Object of ritual. This silvered ghost they called a photograph, though whether it is the ocean, the smiling

woman or their coincidence it honours we do not know. You wonder if she loved or was loved. Their lives have this effect,

their brief, crowded lives. Many of us wept at the frail bubbles of glass, totems they hung in every room, not trusting the dark. We believed

that words, or the weight of a thing in our hands would be enough to make sense of these people, and the hour and lost places of their passing.

—David Barber some thing outside the locked door silver won’t help you no sharpened stake will slow me down oh please like I need permission to come through that door

—David C. Kopaska-Merkel

Star*Line 18 Fall 2018 From the Small Press Astropoetry: Poems Celebrating the Wonders and Mysteries of Space by Christina Sng, Alban Lake, 2017, 45p, paper $6.00, digital $1.99.

A Collection of Nightmares by Christina Sng, Raw Dog Screaming Press, 2017, 88p, paper $10.95, digital $4.99.

One could argue that the very nature of haiku, senryu, and other short poetic forms is to capture an essence and then deliver a twist. In Astropo- etry: Poems Celebrating the Wonders and Mysteries of Space, Christina Sng exceeds and surpasses this, frequently starting with a twist and then deliv- ering another. For example, in “Ceres Mystery,” we see a fact turned into a mystery turned into an ominous technology: Not enough light for Earth to see what’s on Ceres Light absorber works (18)

Even more impressive. “Ceres Mystery” is only one part of an extended poetic series on Ceres that is a fascinating study of the mystery and danger of space. Even more essential to Astropoetry’s success, beyond its technical acu- men and deeply thought-out premises, is Sng’s sense of humor, particularly around Halloween (see “Halloween Detour”). This is most evident in “Hal- loween on the International Space Station,” and the astronaut’s trickery: On the ISS Astronauts dress as aliens Video call to Earth (15)

This sense of joy mixes with the mystery and awe of humanity moving beyond Earth. Astropoetry captures the enormous scope of astronomical travel by layering its poems in the order of distance from the sun, out. We watch as humans take their first stab at colonization, and we see the beauty of the enormous astronomical bodies that ravage distant space. With A Collection of Nightmares: Even the Most Exquisite Dreams Turn Dark, Sng spends much more time in longer-form poetry, but the twists of both theme and execution are even stronger than those of Astropoetry. As opposed to the previous collection, which demonstrated a sense of optimism and wonder in the face of a dangerous universe, A Collection of Nightmares spends more time exploring people trapped with their darkness.

Star*Line 19 Fall 2018 Sometimes literally, as in “They Do Not Sleep,” in which someone tries to run away from their fears, . . . only to find You have locked yourself In with it[.] (22)

Sng’s sense of humor is still present in A Collection of Nightmares, but here it takes the form of gallows humor of the darkest stylings. A peaceful mother takes a nap holding her child’s head in her lap. A cancer patient tries to fly. Pain is healed through cutting flesh. And in sum, Sng shows how these darkest ironies hold the strongest kernels of truth within them. Redemption is a large part of A Collection of Nightmares. An offended woman’s husband finds a way to seek vengeance in her honor. A mother finds a mirror to see her dead son. An abuse victim with “bruises / Piled on top of each other” ends the cycle of violence. Even the Twilight Zone–esque story told in “The Atomizer and the Matchbox.” The characters that populate these poems seek lives fuller than the ones they live within, and will take means to reach them. Sometimes bloody, violent means, but means nonetheless. Astropoetry and A Collection of Nightmares both demonstrate, at their core, Sng’s thematic concerns of human agency. Our ability to succeed, our capacity to fail, and the bounds on both. And within that framework, Sng both places the reader as a human in a vast universe of space and of fear, and reminds us that even when surrounded by this vastness, being human matters.

—Luke Forney

The Bone-Joiner by Sandi Leibowitz, Sycorax Press, 2018, 115p, paper $12.95.

In her first collection, Sandi Leibowitz gathers together forty-eight of her speculative poems, drawing upon both world mythology and folklore, and her own imagination. Divided into five sections, with each section named for a different poem, the collection is loosely organized by theme—but that theme is not immediately obvious. The poems must be studied and carefully considered, their imagery and language examined. The first section, for example, is “Witch-Love.” Superficially, it is -cen tered around the theme of love, and love (romantic, filial, parental, et cetera) does indeed play a prominent role in these poems. But look deeper and the theme is not just love, but the creation and destruction perpetuated in the name of that emotion. In “The Bone-Joiner,” the bereaved bring the bones of their loved ones to an unnamed narrator who restores the dead to some semblance of life. In “The Gifts,” two sisters separated by their very natures

Star*Line 20 Fall 2018 (one is spring and day, the other forest and night) bring beauty to the world around them, and leave gifts of love for one another. “On Failure’s Wings,” on the other hand, deals with the love (person and feeling) that motivates a Creator and his disappointment in that creation. In the poem “Witch-Love,” a witch successively marries the sea, a stone, the wind, and the night, each time recreating and learning more about her true Self. Leibowitz crafts whole new worlds in only a few lines, pulling the reader in, and there is no escape even with the last line. Her poems leave indelible impressions, marking the reader’s imagination and memory. Consider these lines from “Sleeping Gypsy”: “But first I will sing to you / of the moon, / the wind-blessed lands of blue trees peopled with silver cubs / that chase the stars each night.” Or this sequence from “One- Winged,” which is based on the classic fairy tale, “The Wild Swans”: “I will not call it curse. / Air was my element. / I breathed blue.” In The Bone-Joiner, Leibowitz has created a stunning collection which reminds us that the world—every world, real and imagined—is filled with passion, beauty, horror and pain, and that those ideas not only fuel one another, but are often indistinguishable, flowing in and out of one another “in liquid singularity.” Highly recommended.

—Rebecca Buchanan

Ruminations by Ian Brunner, CWP Collective Press, 2017, 35p, paper $5.00.

The publisher has said “Ian’s poems are an homage to the Elder Gods,” and the cover depicts the author levitating in full lotus contemplating his bedroom with its Star Wars poster, D&D supplies, and Spider-Man books and includes a faux comics code stamp. These are somewhat mis- leading sales tools. Ruminations by Ian Brunner does in fact quote H. P. Lovecraft, Madeleine L’Engle, and others, but there are no Elder Gods, nor mentions of Star Wars nor superheroes. The book is far more about a college student who loves such things trying to understand the magic of this world, and the pain of being a lonely fan. As a result, some poems are about the genre more than in the genre. when I was little the books I read always had a protagonist with a friend...... I always had hope after every summer “Maybe this will be the year.” “Maybe I won’t be alone.” (19)

There is, of course, metaphor that leans toward spec:

Star*Line 21 Fall 2018 I know very few people who have managed to keep their joy.

They are lanterns hanging along the paths of life to remind us that some of us do make it (26)

And places that clearly go beyond the literal world. I have experienced hauntings although, I may have been more of a ghost than whatever haunting haunted me. (28)

But more than anything there is an embracing of the fannish manifesto: “Weird at last, weird at last. God Almighty, weird at last.” (29)

I particularly liked the word cloud poem “Escapism,” which is unquot- able due to its form.

The title of the collection is appropriate as the poet ruminates: Science tells us that there are three dimensions and time but it also tells us that what we can see is less than five percent of the matter that makes up the universe. (33)

And perhaps pontificates: There is something other than what we can perceive and we’re all searching for that other. The trick is to not lose the wonder of this world while wondering about the other. (34)

In the end, I found moments of brilliance and pleasurable reading, but also passages that represent the treading of water that most of us do as we wait for maturity to arrive. I suspect that five years from now the author will realize that 25% of the words in this book didn’t add to its strong parts. But those strong parts convince me that the author is worth reading. And I think he is likely to persevere.

—Herb Kauderer

Star*Line 22 Fall 2018 Herding Comets Lost souls

Wrenched from their haunts Jupiter’s angry eye in the Oort Cloud Fascinating scientists and bound for the deserts Smoke signals of crash survivors. of Mars, where they will provide water and simple organics, —Matthew Wilson Moai heads of dirt and frost tumble behind us, outgases trailing like a snowman’s scarf. Hangry

—Robert Borski A gaping chasm runs horizon to horizon under a pitiless sky—

a mouth that yawns boulder moves open to devour any meteors or animals Sisyphus never seemed to get enough that happen by, to chew them of that old time with gravity’s teeth, rock and roll feeding a mother titan’s

—Allan Rozinski ceaseless hunger— It’s time to swallow her children again.

—Deborah L. Davitt The moon has a big icy blotch, Said a show called Astronomy Watch. So the colony oughter Have plenty of water, Though there might be a shortage of Scotch.

—Robert Dawson thought and it thought and it thought until somebody pulled out the plug. somebody pulled out until thought it and thought it and thought

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t h There was an A.I. from Key West g u o Whose programmer left out a test. h t At a quarter to two it They said “How do you do?” nd ht a And it thought and it thought and it thought and it thoug

—Robert Dawson

Star*Line 23 Fall 2018 Cretaceous Zoo

The tyrannosaur couple strolls claw in claw through the Cretaceous zoo with little T. Rex Jr. in a baby stroller as big as a horse-drawn carriage. The dinosaur family hurries and scurries past a herd of plodding triceratops, stroller wheels going clickety clack as they roll over pavement racing towards the most popular exhibit in the zoo known as Future World. Inside Future World the giant reptiles stare and gawk at the tiny almost hairless upright walking apes who the exhibit sign says will one day rule the earth. The dinosaurs laugh at the preposterous thought. How could any creatures with such tiny teeth rule the world? As the sun sets, the dinosaurs watch the night sky, staring with awe and wonder at the beautiful new star that has only recently appeared. The brontosauri lift their long long necks towards the heavens, giant sinus cavities echoing with song, hymns praising this brand new single star constellation. This new star shines a little brighter every night almost as if it is coming a little nearer all the time.

—Gary Every

A Terrible Meat-Eating God After Edward Hirsch

Rolled in butter and herbs my body is a succulent sacrifice and the god takes me in his mouth bit by bit, moaning at the taste of me. His tongue is cat-rough, his teeth straight and white like the feeder system of a great whale. He licks me off his fingers and pieces of me re-converge in his belly. There’s a thin layer of slush down here, sloshing back and forth. It smells holy dank. I clamber onto his heart with my wet feet tucked beneath me and I rub my eyes with bloody hands, waiting for daylight on a shore with no birds, only the hush of waves and the thin promise of morning in the garden of eating.

—Holly Lyn Walrath

Star*Line 24 Fall 2018 FINDING SPECULATIVEStealth POETRY IN NON-GENRESF MAGAZINES

Wouldst Thou Like to Live Deliciously? Denise Dumars

You’ll forgive me if I had to stop writing for awhile and take another shower. Although the Autumnal Equinox is only a week away as I write this, and that means the happiest time of year for some of us is at hand, it’s still hotter than Hades’ sauna at the beach—Manhattan Beach here in Southern California—which means it’s thermonuclear in the valley, or for non-Caifornians, the San Fernando Valley. We all start praying that it will cool off enough by Halloween to make it possible to wear costumes. Our subtitle this time is an infamous line from the filmThe Witch, spoken by one of the best characters, the goat named Black Phillip. The film is remarkable in various ways, not the least of which is that much of its dialogue comes from actual transcripts of Puritan-era journals and court records. Yes, there were many witch trials before Salem in deliciousness-deprived 16th-century Puritan New England. (Ever wonder why Johnny Appleseed was such a big deal in early America? Without apples, people had no SUGAR!) I think I might start hallucinating about talking goats too if I were stuck with the boredom and superstition of that time and place, and without anything sweet. One of the tropes of the film is fear of nature. The dark woods, the black goat, raven, and hare . . . I’m sorry, but when you start fearing a bunny rabbit you need to see a shrink. It could be said that the fear and hatred of the natural world may have helped get us into this mess we’re in today (e.g., global warming, as I alluded to above). But the deliciousness of the earth doesn’t go away just because some people fear it. Autumn is the harvest; it is the era of Pumpkin Spice everything, apple cider (including a cranberry and blood orange hard cider called Black Phillip after our film hero), pan de muertos, sugar skulls, roasted turkey, and sweet potato pie. Maybe we could call it Nature Noir. What do you think? New subgenre of nature poetry? It was the first poem I’m sharing that made me think ofThe Witch: “There is a Devil Inside of Me,” the Poem-a-Day selection for 12 September 2018 on Poets.org. The lines are startling, and to me, suggest the visionary/hallucinogenic experiences associated with magick: Did it soften & thaw into a pool of your shape? Did you whisper to the graven thing, whisper a many lowdown phrase: How are you fallen my btfl?

Star*Line 25 Fall 2018 It turns out that the author of the poem, Carolina Ebeid, was inspired by the art of Cuban-American artist Ana Mendieta, whose gender- fluid performance art and unique pieces using blood and other natural substances, were inspired by native Cuban Santeria. But her best-known works were “earth-works” in which she melded her body into earth, sand, and other natural elements; works which she called Siluetas. She died tragically, from a fall from a window at age 37. I’m not sure how one gets a poem on the Poets.org site for the Poem- a-Day series. All the website says is that the poems are chosen from prominent poets and are first published there, although I have also seen previously published works on the site. Suprimal Poetry Art pays $25 for poems, and this SFnal one fits our bill: “Science Says We Can Live Forever,” by Ayame Whitfield offers images of human lives out of sync with nature’s cycles: there arrives a day when we all grow old at the pace we choose. split the winter days open like blackberries between gleaming teeth, . . .

I liked a lot of the poetry on this site and it looks like there is opportunity for diverse forms, subjects, and poets. Unlikely Stories is politically focused (its focus is “never Trump,” if that gives you an idea) but a lot of their stuff looks SFnal to me. Not sure if they pay, but they take poetry, fiction, art, and criticism. So I’ll share this stanza from “While the Veil is Thin,” by Juliet Cook and j/j hastain: When the time is right, I will create another new embalming fluid that brings dead birds back to life, turns the bird cemetery into a new space and let’s go of all sense of shame.

“While the Veil is Thin” is a reference to a belief about this time of year— especially the days leading up to and right after Halloween and the Day of the Dead—that the “veil” between the worlds of the living and the dead grows thin and allows the possibility of communication between the two. Halloween, by the way, really became popular in the U.S. during the Victorian era. We can thank the Irish fleeing the potato famine for this, and also the greeting card companies, which began their full-on assault on the holidays in the same era. So I’ll share these lines from the online journal Bridge Eight, which publishes a fair amount of really good work, although I don’t see payment info anywhere. I chose the poem “My Victorian England” by Steve Coughlin, in which a man muses on the fictional Victorian era we like to fantasize about—the real one being rather horrible:

Star*Line 26 Fall 2018 love poems bloom on the doorstep of each working-class residence where as we relax in a much respected public house in Whitechapel I do not feel disheartened by our dark tunnel of debt or the monotony of a 6:00 AM alarm clock because in my Victorian England it’s impossible to deny the small treasures at the bakery, the pudgy baker in his white baking hat carrying a tray of chocolate mousse tartlets . . .

Whether or not Bridge Eight pays, it does appear to afford one some bragging rights if one gets published there, as some really well-known poets publish in it. Consequence is another politically leaning magazine (funny how these are turning up this time . . .) They pay $25 a page for poetry, which isn’t bad, and a lot of their poems seem like they’d be interesting, but they don’t put samples online. So the good news is that it’s a paying market, and you get hard copies; the bad news is that you have to buy issues to find out what it’s all about. Isabelle Shepherd’s “We’ll Get There Somewhere,” fromThe Pinch seems a good place to end the column this time. The magazine pays in copies as well as a $200 “featured writer” award for each issue. Should we enter the garden after breaking, the fruits of the garden will be spilled. I’m not here to convince you. My job is to try and show you everything, what we are and what we are not. Start from the point at which we left off—out of love. Out of love, I do this.

Works Cited “Ana Mendieta.” The Art Story.https://www.theartstory.org/artist-mendieta- ana.htm. Black Phillip Hard Cider, Blake’s Hard Cider Co. http://www. blakeshardcider.com/blackphillip/. Cook, Juliet, and j/j hastain. “While the Veil is Thin.”Unlikely Stories, 2 July 2018. http://www.unlikelystories.org/content/concrete-entrenchment- star-spangled-bullets-and-while-the-veil-is-thin. Coughlin, Steve. “My Victorian England.” Bridge Eight. http://www. bridgeeight.com/new-poems-by-steve-coughlin/. Ebeid, Carolina. “There is a Devil Inside of Me.” Poem-a-Day.Poets.org , 12 September 2018. https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/there-devil- inside-me. Shepherd, Isabelle. “We’ll Get There Somewhere.”The Pinch. http://www. pinchjournal.com/http/wwwpinchjournalcom/pinchpoetry/2017/9/29/ well-get-there-somewhere-isabelle-shepherd. Whitfield, Ayame. “Science Says We Can Live Forever.”Subprimal Poetry Art, 14 August 2018. https://subprimal.com/issues/issue12/science-says- we-can-live-forever-by-ayame-whitfield. The Witch. Directed by Robert Eggers, 2015. http://thewitch-movie.com.

Star*Line 27 Fall 2018 Markets Bridge Eight. http://www.bridgeeight.com/. Consequence Magazine. http://www.consequencemagazine.org/. The Pinch. http://www.pinchjournal.com/. Subprimal Poetry Art. https://subprimal.com/. Unlikely Stories. http://www.unlikelystories.org/.

Claimant

She desperately wanted to marry a kind human. Each evening she grew a delicate new hymen. Her favorite elixir changed absolutely nothing but the color of the antidote.

At dawn, façades shed their protective mirrors. Glittering powder dusted the broadening meres. No one was hungry enough to eat anything prepared by anomalies.

When summoned, she put on a satin underwire. The intricacies of her hair concealed the whirr. She was decorated for rancor and something else under an antonym.

Days accumulated in drifts of dark wreaths. No one acknowledged the shuddering wraiths. The trees offered to translate almost everything into the tongues of her ancestors.

She shed her fading scales in order to resume an occupation she did not list on her résumé. Her fatalistic overseer manifested as a thing neither angel nor animal.

—F. J. Bergmann electric savior cold tentacles malfunctioning on the mount warm heart messiah kaboom we get kraken

—Brian Gene Olson —LeRoy Gorman

Star*Line 28 Fall 2018 Date Night Fate

Night has ignition Our plane arrived late, city blooms reds and blues a Westin prop passenger plane young male is glued to the mirror with square windows, circa 1930. stylish green furrows Late, because it landed bright yellow knobs with a gaping hole in the fuselage under the nasal passages where we were seated; you in your pretty red hat, a couple of gob-dots the one with feathers on the side but quickly creamed over that made me sneeze. and a goggly with roots jerked out So we’re stuck in the hereafter, painfully you, still there next to me, but necessarily wearing the same awful hat, and me, eternally cursed must look his best with spectral sneezes. double-checks his antennae prepares for the moment —Marge Simon of cross-sexual genesis somewhere out there a young female is combing her exo-braids buffing her inkblot lips triple moons rising matchmaker wind blowing soon enough she’ll have a hundred eyes upon her Fate by Marge Simon all of them his

—John Grey iSpell

her muttered incantations never worked until she realized dystopic future iambic pentameter my smart house sends me was no longer compatible to my room shifting to binary

—C. William Hinderliter —John Reinhart

Star*Line 29 Fall 2018 Publishing HOW THE Speculative POETRY BUSINESS WORKSPoetry

Rejectomancy and Rejection Rates Herb Kauderer

For a tight and thematic issue of a publication, containing natural pro- gressions of poems and themes, a good-sized pool of poems to choose from is necessary. The idea of simply gathering a bunch of fine poems sets the issue’s bar low, and raising that bar requires being ready to reject good publishable poems that meet all the guidelines. Most poets understand routine reasons good poems get rejected. “Recently accepted poems on the same theme” is high on the list, as is “Issues are full for the next two years.” Of course, the number one reason is “tastes vary” and your poem did not make it over the editor’s buying threshold. As a tribe I think we get that. But, I’m suggesting that editors should be receiving lots more buyable poems than they can buy because that sets a higher bar. When an editor can fill her issue on, say, ten percent or less of the buyable submissions, the issue can grow into something greater, with transitions, themes, clusters of related work, and progressions. This is the difference between my daughter gathering wildflowers, and a beautiful wreath created by a florist. Looking at it this way gives rejectomancy a nice tool for looking at rejections; after all, it argues that your poem was probably wonderful, just not lucky enough to fit into the growing metas of the issue being edited. And if this article does nothing more than bring that home, it’s a success. But there is another way to look at those rejection numbers. If qual- ity markets are buying only ten percent of buyable poems, then you shouldn’t be selling too high a percentage of your submissions unless you are in the advanced stages of your career. If you are selling too high a percent, you might not be challenging yourself as an artist. This observation came up when writing student Matt asked “what was the best market you ever submitted to?” I replied I twice submitted poet- ry to The New Yorker. He asked if I got form rejections, and I replied that the first submission received a form rejection, but the second received a personal note complimenting the poem and encouraging me to submit again when they reopened. Matt asked when I got that rejection, and I answered, almost twenty years ago. When the students present realized that twenty years ago The New Yorker had encouraged me to submit, and I never sent them another poem, they all looked at me like I was an idiot. And they were right.

Star*Line 30 Fall 2018 Since that time I have always had a challenge list, poems I felt particu- larly good about and therefore submit to much more challenging mar- kets. Rejection looks a lot different when your attitude is that you aren’t challenging yourself if you don’t have a high enough rejection rate. The moral of the article is that rejection is good for you, in the right measure. Of course, your mileage may vary.

Transformation Wind Chimes worse for Lunar base wind chimes, werewolf. near air conditioning vent, longing to be home. coarse hair sprouts a drink from to take —G. O. Clark skull. in this long teeth cool ice asteroidinosaurecall that can shelf, shake the —LeRoy Gorman a throat dripping. like a hand. the ice. all tearing. all small moon’s bobbing reflection little dinner in bubbling sea. rolls ripped to shreds Is the and sprinkled, water boiling is the this becoming. blister rising the pressing howl of of one’s mind the blooming Happiest Childhood Memories between two tiger lilies by Christina Sng slabs of cool along the shore. marble, moon glowing like moon, first frost like white the cornfield rattles hot coin. its bones

—Jacob Skillings —F. J. Bergmann

Star*Line 31 Fall 2018 New from the Quantum Physics Book Club: Demifelicide: the 4 1/2 Lives of Schrödinger’s Cat

—Robert Borski full autumn moon— in the bathroom mirror the werewolf in my armpit Wish You Were Here —Susan Burch Hell’s front door was open wide, I slipped inside, the watchdog wolfing Steaks, three times I tossed them, There were no other guards. lost my gun Yeah, I was there to get my girl rushing in to fight New tracks on my phone were smoking hot hand-to-mandible They had to be, I had to bring her back No way another gal could match Euridice. —Brian Gene Olson She rapped the vocals in our band Black leather, a scalding sexy witch A voice to sell your soul for No one fired up a crowd like Euridice. grandma died last night We had a thing dad forgot to plug her in Road trips became erotic jaunts charging: 1% Though sometimes I felt jealous Of her multi-gendered groupies. —Ngo Binh Anh Khoa But then she went and died ODed in the tour-bus bathroom While we were all too stoned To save her, to even know.

I swore I’d bring her back, She’d be free or I’d stay too Across the gap I’d slipped And wandered searching everywhere

I can’t tell you what I heard and saw Who made the cut, who screamed for pity

Star*Line 32 Fall 2018 Or rode and wailed in dark delight four arms are better Or why I took that draught dueling an army of men the expert sword bot That made me look away. —Marcus Vance The corridors of gloom, where phantoms slink And deliquesce, and stinks insinuate and stimulate The mind, which shrinks; its fears perpetuate The legends of this place.

A plane of jars, in each a head, pressed tight Against the glass, tears squeezed from blinded eyes O’erfill the jars, a sea they make On that bleak and chill expanse.

Above the dim-lit strand the seabirds call spaceship window— Demand the dead their litanies dispel, my face Nor break the prison jars, and free the shades tattooed with stars to roam that dismal shore. —Lorraine Schein We fled but Euridice spent too much time Looking back, she caught the eyes Of many-taloned guards; they killed me, And of course Euridice was dead already.

Still, I’m having the time of my death Euridice and I, both in love with pain When making love, our burning flesh, the smell Expand, augment the thrill unbearable.

Fellow band members, in closing: Wish you were here.

—David C. Kopaska-Merkel Drones & Dragons Disaster and Kendall Evans Census-taking aircraft mistaken for junior offspring— time stream convergence how were we to know my grandpa killing his grandpa sparks from our NiCads before me would ignite dragon’s milk?

—C. William Hinderliter —Robert Borski

Star*Line 33 Fall 2018 The Septenary World alien infant clutching tightly special blankie —a found poem from quilted human skin Ancient and Modern Physics by Thomas E. Willson (1902) —John Reinhart universe the smaller universe material string applying The Time Traveler’s Proposal they come unraveled Let Time and Space bloom in confusion beneath our hands, prints staining Orion’s Belt, merely spiritual circumsteller disks, and distant moons astral atom the way da Vinci’s fill-in angel miniature overpowered his master’s spell. physics in its last analysis Let your timeline unspool, twining universe in miniature with mine until we are full of knots. a peach Count them like a sailor, measuring the speed of memories gained or lost —Kimberly Nugent in my bright Pandora’s box

while I protect you from the monsters until you forget me. The meaningless blip of your child’s first words will resonate louder than our trip to hear the Big Bang . . . You slip

into a linear life, and soon I linger at your grave after the funeral flow ebbs, leaving a pool of roses greater than the days I’ve fully lived and known. Teach me the slow road. Earworm —Phoebe Wagner his charred body clutching a theremin on the tarmac santa sees bright flash torched for busking rudolph regrets nose change to Budrys spaceport nuclear power

—Benjamin Whitney Norris —Denny E. Marshall

Star*Line 34 Fall 2018 growth spurt A Rondeau on the Televised Launch shedding my skin of the First Rotating Wheel Spaceship too early “Apparent weight,” not gravity, —Billy Antonio is what the spinning ship creates, not 1g, as was claimed, in the popular press, repeated in the presidential address, at launch, with jokes about muscle atrophy: for the first time “To avoid feeling like a manatee,” his two hearts the president said, “we made gravity beat as one within a ship, spinning,” no one corrected: intergalactic apparent weight, not gravity. dating site And when he said, “Finally, the world will see, —Billy Antonio with this new ship dawns an era of peace,” his face smiling from the TV set, teeth like stars, the words possessed faith in spin in policy, apparent weight, not gravity.

—R. Mac Jones

The Space Helmet Hand Dryer Where the Science Fiction Writers Meet

It does look like a space helmet This new curved white thing mounted on the wall of the gents’ toilet in the church where the science fiction writers meet

A strip of blue lights pulse up and down the front like an alien soldier’s helmet denoting readyness, perhaps energy levels fully charged unarmed You don’t feel any pain when putting your hands underneath they thought his proboscis but your hands have been neatly severed was a gun transported elsewhere they’ll do more training

—Ian Hunter —Justin Short

Star*Line 35 Fall 2018 Designated Responsibilities for Spokesparticles

[T]he Higgs boson, the spokesparticle of the Higgs field, must have some relationship with dark matter particles. (Symmetry Magazine, 02/20/18)

Thirty spokes / meet in the hub. / Where the wheel isn’t / is where it’s useful. (Tao Te Ching, Ursula K. Le Guin, trans.)

Coming to you live from Higgs Field Today we interview Higgs Boson, Spokesparticle for Universe Corporation, regarding her designated responsibilities for particle outreach interactions. We are told that “spoke” refers to the support structure of a wheel as well as officially sanctioned speech. Higgs’s ansible communications describe mundane and mystical activities “wheeling and dealing for galactic unity,” suggesting intriguing questions for future study by physicists and theologians. The quantum excitation of the crowd is evident outside CERN Hadron Collider where Higgs reportedly meets with Dark Matter Industries, Arthur the King a cognitively seductive interchange of ideas. Rumors of self-coupling may be unfounded. Nostrils smoking And now here’s Higgs [applause] . . . He storms inside Well, it looks like we missed her again, The stone castle, but this busy woman has left us proof Eyes blazing, tongue of her continuous positive regard: Sharp as fiery sword. twin neonatal tau fermions. [applause] Will someone please call the nanny? His army also armed With many shields of —Sandra Lindow Shiny tempered scales.

They gather, Dragons Of the Round Table, moonlit sea In the clandestine dark mangled shark corpses Looking for one good and a vampire seal [K]night to celebrate.

—Greg Schwartz —John C. Mannone

Star*Line 36 Fall 2018 earth’s gravity dies finally things are looking up

—Denny E. Marshall Moon of a far planet a dim egg-blue moon looms low in the subarctic sky cloudless and free for once of the haze breezing in from the boreal blazes this spring evening you amble back from the corner store wondering for the nth time why you moved across the country to work from home in this alien northern town that faint nailclip moon looks like a movie poster moon like an airbrushed cliché anchored above a far planet’s violet sky opulent with constellations a planet where some dozen corpse mongers hoard more in their dead fists than the billions of the barely living whose pockets vibrate and snitch on their whereabouts a planet where ancient giant insects still hunt among the soft-shelled refugees from the latest ice age a planet whose skies writhe with ghost lights each night a planet where soldiers storm homes to stop sharing where funerals for music teachers feature no music where only barest scrutiny gets held to dead cities a planet where the rate at which burned land refreshes its green screen televises a promise that even a fire can tell a vision a planet where in the interminable winter you stud your shoes with screws to walk ice coated streets with a hyper spaniel a planet no weirder nor farther than anyone’s prairie area code with friends only close onscreen as forest fire smoke encroaches to see the moon like this is to marvel and fear how far our planet is from anything but our own devices

—Mark A. McCutcheon

Star*Line 37 Fall 2018 (Under)worlds Collide (an ovillejo chain) the alien’s suit Makaría, my girl, though you’ve heard not spades or hearts Every word but hyperboloids Of this myth I’ve recounted before, I implore —D. A. You—indulge me again. For at last Xiaolin You’ve surpassed Spires Fragile childhood’s constraints. Now hold fast And let fantasy shift into creed. You’re Persephone’s daughter; please heed Every word, I implore. You’ve surpassed hid his voodoo doll Expectations I set at your birth. unexpected orgasms From my dearth his girlfriend found it You drew bountiful joy; from disgrace You forged grace. —William And it’s clear that your eyes could induce Landis Mighty Zeus To devise an elaborate ruse That would send you careening unseen Down to Hades, where I was once queen. From my dearth, you forged grace mighty Zeus— Icarus Who, three decades ago sent me bound made up his mind Underground a fictional character As a chthonian bride—would aspire leaping off the page To acquire. Once, Demeter’s stray heart, all aglow his nom de plume For the beau on a suicide note She’d just met, allowed Zeus to sew woe. He pared back the earth’s crust, laying waste —Benjamin To her harvest and left me displaced Whitney Underground to acquire. For the beau Norris Who then claimed me, I burned seven years. Through her tears, Fair Demeter cursed Earth and repealed Springtime’s yield, Vowing Winter would linger till I Bid goodbye To the underworld. Hades complied, For the innocent girl he’d once craved Was no more. As I rose, Mother waved Through her tears. Springtime’s yield bid goodbye

Star*Line 38 Fall 2018 To its seven-year drought. But although Status quo Seemed to flourish again, when detained I’d retained Hades’ seed. It entrenched its black song For so long In my belly, no matter how wrong, The abyss still enthralled me. When eight time travel retail More years passed, I spit out the innate BLOWOUT SALE Status quo I’d imbibed for so long, YESTERDAY

And descended at twenty to reign —LeRoy Gorman Hell’s domain. Disavowing my schooling to seek Dark’s mystique, In the city, I stripped on a stage To assuage autumn bonfire What convention had trapped in a cage. the trees shiver And I deemed each male patron a thrall a little closer On whose worship I’d draw to recall Hell’s domain—dark’s mystique. To assuage —F. J. Bergmann The lacuna lost innocence spread In its stead, I sought lust, till a man who’d paid much Dared to touch Me as Zeus had once touched. But his ploy Mining Solo To destroy My esteem served instead to deploy on this barren asteroid Comprehension. Mercurial youth at night, the silence Had to forfeit illusion that truth, wakes me In its stead, dared to touch—to destroy. no soft rain While these decades I’ve learned to delight no rustling breeze In the light, through leaves I acknowledge I’ll always endure Dark’s allure. no frog lullaby For the Hades against which I strain nor chirping crickets Lives to reign. not even Makaría, I’ll need not explain When, from underworld’s embers you rise an incessantly And return to me, blinking your eyes barking dog In the light—dark’s allure lives to reign. for company —Mindy Watson —Lauren McBride

Star*Line 39 Fall 2018 wOLF FLOw

I fear the mirror of the long night’s moon: All the world is backwards in its face but me. It makes the colours seep away Grey as weeping, soft as cobwebs, It shrinks the cup in my kitchen to a thimble, The jug on my table to a cup; The knife becomes a toothpick, the food dust,

It turns the drink to vinegar and bitter rue; The safe walls of home: moonlight makes a cage; The linen shirt upon my back it shreds.

The dark path that twists forsaken in the day Between the storm-broken pines and scrub Towards the haunted castle on the hill Is a highway paved with silver through the night To the mountains, no longer ice and granite Against a stormy sky, but a land of promise Where I run between sweet and endless trees

Lovers, friends, companions are strangely changed To hunters, hunted, enemy, persecutors And prey fleeing in the falling snow

As I remain a shepherd herding in the field But find in barn my meat-hook changed to claw And my butcher’s blade to sharp white teeth So in the thin light of that mad cold moon Man and maid graze as sheep: Their flesh and blood changed to wine and bread, Their death to life, their life to death.

—Oliver Smith

whirring of wheels on asphalt the only sounds from the track— two particles too quiet, for the fans’ liking, both alike in dignity since NASCAR atomic romance went electric

—Marcie Lynn Tentchoff —Lisa Timpf

Star*Line 40 Fall 2018 Don’t Step In The Same Reality Twice

When paradigm shift 7 the deep vibrato kicked in, of growling bullfrogs no one cared. in a martian pond Compared to previous shifts it weren't no classic—merely —Alzo David-West an irritation across the calibration systems.

By the time the 29th paradigm black hellebore in Hades’ was in place, pomegranate smoothie shifts were graded: scaled 1 to 10. endless summer

Then a shift came. —F. J. Bergmann Changed everything, it did. Shifted paradigm-thinking as we knew it: The shift to end all shifts,they said.

Nothing would ever be the same again . . . Similar to how nothing was ever the same twice— just before we classified, knew things, and fit our thought to paradigms.

—Soren James Diana’s Own Black Sky

shuddering silver starship upon its lunar Launchpad poised in lesser gravity alien ruins mysterious beneath the shine of earth- whisper-music of the dead light, the high-moon high-noon dark sky carries on the breeze flaming fiery countdown —Brian Gene Olson . . . the starship breathes forth dragon fire, lifting off so slowly roaring . . . soaring into Diana’s own dark-black-night in magic earth-lit moon-sky brain operation— happy it is not a tumor —Kendall Evans sad that alien died

—Denny E. Marshall

Star*Line 41 Fall 2018 WORLDWIDE SPECULATIVEXenoPoetry POETRY IN TRANSLATION

CEBUANO EKPHRASTIC POETRY BY JONEL ABELLANOSA

Pasipala

Dinasig sa Little Animals ni John Reinhart

Sa akong pangandoy nga madungog, Nga makit-an kang nagsilaw sa Yutan-ong puwa-puwa, malimtan ko Ang kasugoan nga gi hilwas sa ukoy Kinsa mopakita og dagwayng mayubiton, Buayang ikog, iyang dila nga Biaybiay sa akong kabastos. Way mga palakbit sa mga gagmayng Mananap sa akong baba, mga pulong Sa pangilaba akong gi litok sama sa Little Animals by John Reinhart Kabukogan sa akong kahigawad. Di ko malingaw sa mga agad-ad Ug ngulob tali sa akong mga ngipon. Kan-on nako ang mga unod Sa akong kabugal-bugalon, nya Maglingaw-lingaw kos lami ug duga Sa unsay makapalagot nako.

—Jonel Abellanosa Blasphemy

AfterLittle Animals by John Reinhart

In my desire to be heard, To witness you splendored In earthen shades of red, I forget the commandment Uttered by the merman who Reveals only his derisive face And crocodile tail, his tongue

Star*Line 42 Fall 2018 Sticking out at my impudence. Editor’s Note: John Reinhart There are no hints of the little wrote us about this art piece: Animals in my mouth, words “A gift to his dentist, John Of invocation I express like Reinhart’s erasure poem-collage Skeletons of my disappointments. Little Animals celebrates the beasts that accompany us all.” Grunts and growls between Cebuano, the second largest My teeth don’t amuse me. I devour of 180+ Philippine languages, The flesh of my own impertinence, is spoken by 22 million people And revel in the succulence in the central and southern Of what angers me. Philippines.

—Jonel Abellanosa

In Memoriam Steve Sneyd (1941-2018) SFPA 2015 Grand Master Steve Sneyd was bearded with a shaggy fringe of greying hair, and an air of constant pre-occupation. Reading to an audience—as he did in his mesmeric set at the Huddersfield Poetry Festival—he conjured time and space, myth and magic, history and futures through a temporal warp, and then back to the Hotel bar again with a bardic resonance that story-tells and weaves strange truths, ‘finding skulls under every grin.’ ‘Poetry, in the final analysis,’ he told me, ‘is surely nearer—or can be—to the working of actual thought, than prose.’ Steve’s writing began appearing in late sixties publications, his idiosyncratic highly distinctive style determined by breath-measured lines, until few magazines escaped without one or Blasphemy two of his pieces within. Through the seventies and eighties, as the DIY-press scene evolved, he expanded more into his own mythic AfterLittle Animals SF-voice informed by Wikipedia-shattering familiarity with esoteric by John Reinhart by-ways of deep elsewhere-forgotten histories. There were no less than 5,000 Steve Sneyd poems published, and every one of them In my desire to be heard, carries a line, a phrase, an image, or an insight that illuminates. He To witness you splendored was part of no movement, and never wanted to be, he was his own In earthen shades of red, entirely self-contained continuum, informal and egalitarian. Steve I forget the commandment was a one-off. And for me, without Steve’s unique and distinctive Uttered by the merman who presence, the poetry world will be a weird place indeed. Reveals only his derisive face —Andrew Darlington And crocodile tail, his tongue

Star*Line 43 Fall 2018 Cybernetic Harvest STAR*LINE (a collaborative triptych) Journal of the Science Fiction and Fantasy metal seeds Poetry Association (SFPA) implanted © 2018 STAR*LINE in the names of in the soy fields individual contributors. Rights revert to individual creators on publication. these robotic sprouts Opinions herein are not necessarily in steel and space age plastic— those of STAR*LINE staff or the SFPA beware the rust blight membership or its representatives. SUBSCRIPTION RATES: 4 issues/year: $10 .pdf + Dwarf Stars rovers with chainsaws— anthology; $24 print U.S. incl. postage harvesting titanium sprouts 1 issue: $2.50 .pdf; $5 print + $2 sh requires special care Overseas: sfpoetry.com/starline.html SFPA MEMBERSHIP includes —Deborah L. Davitt, Star*Line subscription and more! Gretchen Tessmer, and See sfpoetry.com/join.html D. A. Xiaolin Spires Make all funds payable to SFPA. PayPal to [email protected]

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