DESCENT INTO LIGHT

Karen Burnham, who runs the Locus Roundtable at Locus Online, has rounded up a series of speculative poetry-related posts, podcasts and interviews for the month of May, and I got to be first out of the gate.

Here’s my guest blog post: “Let us go then, you and I: an introduction to speculative poetry”

And here’s a podcast I did with Karen and Star*Line editor F.J. Bergmann.

In both I’ve taken the names in vain of a number of poets and poetry publications.

As part of its National Poetry Month series, Tor.com has posted a lovely review by Brit Mandelo of the latest issue of Mythic Delirium. Among the things she had to say:

Every poem in Mythic Delirium 26 has powerful imagery; capturing in words a startling scene or visual is something that speculative poetry lends itself to. The majority of the poets also have fun with syntax and diction in ways that produce interesting tensions. Another thing that is intriguing about this issue is something that Allen notes in his introduction: the sense of community among speculative poets in on display here. That closeness produces and inspires so much continuing work — poems for birthdays, poems for other poets’ recent work; the strands of influence and inspiration are an intricate spider’s web to trace across the readings in the issue.

The issue itself is organized in a thematic arc — it opens with science fictional poems and then shifts through fantastic genres, with poems grouped along the spectrum. That, in particular, is one reason I thought to include Mythic Delirium 26 in our Poetry Month discussions: it’s a good introduction to spec-poetry, thanks to the variety within.

Art by Tim Mullins

Congratulations to all the contributors, and special congratulations to G.O. Clark, S. Brackett Robertson, Rose Lemberg, Alexandra Seidel, Amal El-Mohtar, Sonya Taaffe, C.S.E. Cooney, and Virginia M. Mohlere, whose works were highlighted for further praise and scrutiny. (And of course, if you want to read them yourself, here’s how to get them.)

I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out that this series also contains a review of Stone Telling 7, an appreciation of Goblin Fruit, and excellent poems by Catherynne M. Valente, Jo Walton and Roz Kaveney. To Tor.com, the Poetry Guy doffs his hat in gratitude.

I’d also be remiss in not pointing out that tomorrow is the final day of the Mythic Delirium 27 submission window.

A new issue of Goblin Fruit is always a reason to celebrate. And I’m delighted that this issue’s guest artist is none other than longtime Mythic Delirium contributor Paula Friedlander.

Goblin Fruit co-editor Amal El-Mohtar is also a contributor to the latest issue of Mythic Delirium, and received her copy in time to pose the two newborn issues together. Note that by coincidence (or is it?) they are color coordinated.

The ReaderCon cup (also black and red on white) is not insignificant: ReaderCon is where we’ve held joint readings of our two venues and hope to hold a celebration of mythic poetry this year. Well done, Miss Amal.

I have been through many a cringe-inducing conversation in my life wherein someone identifies themselves to me as a fellow published poet, and then reveals that they were published by the National Library of Poetry, one of the most infamous scams in recent publishing history. It appears a company is using the old NLoP website, Poetry.com, to attempt to stage a comeback. Writer Beware has more details.

I feel the need to once again exhibit one of my prize possessions. I once sent in an obvious joke poem to this company just to prove that everyone became a “semi-finalist,” regardless of what they submitted, and were then asked to pay a steep price for the privilege of seeing their work in print. Here, once again, is the scan of the envelope I received after I submitted, with the poem all prettily typeset in the display window:

At one time, this poem was actually available on Poetry.com (even though I never responded to their offer) before someone apparently noticed my postings about it and removed it.

As I continue to work on my Secret Second Novel, a number of cool things sort of accumulated all at once. I shall enumerate them here.

I have a new poem, “Surcease,” out in Issue 3 of the recently-revived Inkscrawl, edited by Samantha Henderson, published by Rose Lemberg. Inkscrawl specializes in poems of 10 lines or less. Lots of other good work in this one too, by Mari Ness, Alexa Seidel, Howard Hendrix, Kristine Ong Muslim, Ann K. Schwader and more.

My newest “Tour of the Abattoir” column has appeared in the latest Tales to Terrify podcast. This month, my friend Shalon Hurlbert and I dissect an obscure almost-gem, the bizarre J-horror flick Marebito, from Ju-On: The Grudge creator Takashi Shimizu.

Over at StarShipSofa, the sister podcast of TtT, Diane Severson’s latest edition of Poetry Planet features a Rhysling Award-nominated poem, “TimeFlood,” that I co-wrote with Ian Watson. Gardner Dozois bought it for Asimov’s not long before he retired from that editing post. The poem’s part of an ensemble focused on time travel.

Back to Rose Lemberg again, my tiny contribution to Issue 7 of her webzine Stone Telling, called the “Queer Issue” and dedicated to LGBT themes, involves playing the role of “Abe” in the audio recording of Lisa Bradley’s epic meta-horror poem “we come together we fall apart.” It’s a powerful issue overall, I’m flattered to have a bit part in it.

Not to be found online: I’ve just received my copy of the Danish sf fanzine Fandom Forever — it’s a seriously old-school DIY zine — which contains my poem “A Prayer,” as well as four reprinted poems: “Strange Cargo,” “Tithonus on the Shore of Ocean,” “Charon Finds a Woman on the Gridshore” and “retrovirus.” The issue also holds work by Tobias S. Buckell, Peter Payack, Bruce Boston and  Lavie Tidhar.

Extra bonus: There’s been a special illustrated poster made of Neil Gaiman’s poem “Conjunctions,” which I first published in Mythic Delirium issue 20 — and Neil autographed a copy for me and had it sent to me. And I got it today and am now basking in the glow. (The art you see along the left is an image of the poster.)

Three months later than I originally planned, I’ve finished converting Clockwork Phoenix 2: More Tales of Beauty and Strangeness to e-book format. It’s available now on Amazon for Kindle and will soon be available in EPUB and MOBI format at Weightless Books.

Between reacquainting myself with the Clockwork Phoenix books and some of the reprint sales I’ve made it seems like I’ve spent much of the past four months walking down memory lane. This stretch is particularly gilded: it’s a bit mind-boggling to me how well this book and these stories wound up doing. To enumerate:

• • Overall, first starred review in Publishers Weekly for a Norilana Book (and for anything I’ve put together.)
• • “Hooves and the Hovel of Abdel Jameela” by Saladin Ahmed was a 2009 Nebula Award finalist, picked for reprinting in Nebula Awards Showcase 2011 and Hartwell and Cramer’s Year’s Best Fantasy 10.
• • “each thing i show you is a piece of my death” by Gemma Files and Stephen J. Barringer was a finalist for the 2010 Shirley Jackson Awards and the 2010 WSFA Small Press Award for Short Fiction and was reprinted in Ellen Datlow’s Best Horror of the Year 2.
• • Ann Leckie’s “The Endangered Camp” was reprinted in Horton’s Year’s Best Science Fiction and Fantasy 2010.
  Claude Lalumière’s “Three Friends” was also selected by Hartwell and Cramer for Year’s Best Fantasy 10.
• • Tanithe Lee’s “The Pain of Glass” and Gemma and Stephen’s novelette made the 2009 Locus Magazine Recommended Reading List.
• • Gardner Dozois, in his Year’s Best Science Fiction 27, gave honorable mentions to Kelly Barnhill’s “Open the Door and the Light Poors Through,” Leah Bobet’s “Six,” Marie Brennan’s “Once a Goddess,” Mary Robinette Kowal’s “At the Edge of Dying,” Barbara Krasnoff’s “Rosemary, That’s For Remembrance,” Ann’s story, and Claude’s, Tanith’s, and Gemma and Stephen’s novelettes. That’s well over half the book!
• • Datlow, in her extended Honorable Mentions list for that year, gave nods to Ian McHugh’s “Angel Dust” and Barbara’s short story.

If there’s anything else (whew!) I don’t remember it right now….

This review of the anthology by Amal El-Mohtar remains my personal favorite. I’m glad to book this “choir of the uncanny” for performances in a new venue.

P.S.: It occurs to me that I should link to the first volume too!

Here’s Paula Friedlander‘s illustration for G.O. Clark‘s “Lost in the Static.”

For even more of Paula’s work, here she is at artistrising.com, Cafe Press, and Etsy.

This ends the preview for this week. You can see the issue’s complete table of contents here. If you don’t want to miss it, subscribe to the paper version here at MythicDelirium.com or the electronic version here at Weightless Books.

And by the way, Mythic Delirium reopens to submissions today. I’m now reading for Issue 27.

Illustration © 2012 by Paula Friedlander. All rights reserved.

Here’s Daniel Trout’s illustration for “The Forest King” by Alexandra Seidel. (Intriguingly, this is a case of art begetting art begetting art; Alexa’s poem was in turn inspired by this painting by Anita, also included in the issue in a b&w version.)

Don’t want to miss the issue? Subscribe to the paper version here at MythicDelirium.com or the electronic version here at Weightless Books.

Illustration © copyright 2012 by Daniel Trout. All rights reserved.

Here’s Paula Friedlander‘s illustration for “Tryptich: an Offering of Fruit” by Dan Campbell.

Full table of contents viewable here. If you don’t have a subscription and want one, or you need to renew, click here.

Illustration © 2012 by Paula Friedlander. All rights reserved.

The latest of Larry Santoro’s Tales to Terrify podcasts includes my second “Tour of the Abattoir” column, in which I join the voices calling for a change in the World Fantasy Award statuette and give John Langan’s debut collection Mr. Gaunt and Other Uneasy Encounters the abattoir treatment. Also included, fiction by P.D. Cacek and John Everson.