DESCENT INTO LIGHT: Mike Allen’s Home Page

A couple of bits of news from opposite ends of the literary spectrum this week.   My poem “A Curtain of Stars” is being reprinted in Artemis Journal, a beautiful Southwest Virginia literary magazine that’s being revived after more than a decade of dormancy. Like

Strange Horizons today released an all-poetry issue, complete with an extensive two part podcast, and I’m honored that my new poem “The Paper Boy” — the only new poem I produced last year — gets to be part of it. (You can read it here.)

Last year this time I was ill and bedridden. This year, I’m simply inconvenienced thanks to a kaput computer. I consider this a step up.   In fact I was so sick at this time in 2012 that my year-end summary didn’t turn up until

I’m thrilled to be able to show off Paula Friedlander’s amazing cover art for my next poetry collection, Hungry Constellations.     This collection originates with the Mythic Delirium Kickstarter. None of my poetry collections are available in ebook form, so as incentive to make

There’s a new issue of Goblin Fruit out, which is always reason to celebrate.     I have a special reason beyond the norm to celebrate this particular issue. The Goblin Queens have honored me by publishing “Hungry Constellations,” a light-hearted (for me) meditation on

I’m pleased to report that Strange Horizons is buying my new poem “The Paper Boy,” a grim meditation on a crime’s aftermath. Thanks go to Romie Stott for accepting it and to Dominik Parisien for motivating me to write it. #SFWApro   I’m also pleased

My contributor’s copy arrived today of the Russian edition of Ellen Datlow’s Best Horror of the Year One, which contains my poem “The Thirteenth Hell.” This is the first time my work has ever been translated. It’s neat to see my name in Cyrillic. (Photos

I’m pleased to announce that my strange somewhat science fictional poem “Dearly Beloved” has just sold to Canadian anthology series Postscripts to Darkness.   I’m especially tickled because “Dearly Beloved” is part of a series — it’s set in the same far future world as

Ellen Datlow has posted her annual “long list” of honorable mentions (Part 1) (Part 2) selected from the material she read for this year’s edition of The Best Horror of the Year.   I was pleased to discover I earned four this year for stuff

The completely free e-book only poetry anthology Flying Higher: An Anthology of Superhero Poetry, edited by Shira Lipkin and Michael Damian Thomas, just came out today. It contains among many other things my incredibly silly poem “Darksein the Diabolic Plots His Comeback from Beyond the