Poetry
Reviews of poetry.
Distillations: Visions of Time
Around here, March is when spring starts making its tentative appearance. If fall and winter are about remembering the past, spring is all about the future. In many ways, this idea of change is where science fiction began. What will happen next? What will the world be like if X happens? What will […]
Continue ReadingDreams & Nightmares #78
Dreams & Nightmares #78 contains ten poems, many of them illustrated. The shortest in the issue is “Still Falling” by Anne K. Schwader, a nine-line piece, vaguely oriental in style. The first stanza grabbed me right from the start:
It’s not only black holes,
you know: all events
have horizons….
Those lines open the poem up […]
Dreams & Nightmares #77
There are 15 poems in the 77th issue of Dreams & Nightmares, which seems a large number for this publication. As usual, there is a nice mix of fantasy, science fiction, and myth, but for once the poems that most catch my eye are among the more futuristic of those offered.
“Spring in Rutherford County” […]
Dreams & Nightmares #76
Issue #76 of Dreams & Nightmares contains twelve poems, which rage in size from a three-line haiku to a four-page poetically told myth.
The issue opens with “Till Stars Turn Strange,” a piece of Norse verse by Tom Galusha. Old Norse poetic forms rely as much on very strict alliteration as on meter or […]
Distillations: Scifaiku
Even during a leap year, February is the shortest month. For this month’s column, we will explore the haiku form, which is short by design. Unlike the miserable cold of February (at least for those in the northern hemisphere), haiku is delightful. Everything unnecessary has been pared away. All that remains are the seventeen syllables, […]
Continue ReadingMythic Delirium #17, Summer/Fall 2007
Mythic Delirium #17 (Summer/Fall 2007) is the most recent issue of this poetry-only print magazine.
MD 17 contains 21 poems by as many poets. Most of these poems are mythic and most of them are fantasy. There is such a thing as mythic science fiction, and there is some here. Or […]
Distillations: Assonance
This month we continue our exploration of poetry techniques with assonance, defined as the repetition of vowel sounds. Last month, I referred to assonance as “alliteration’s crafty cousin.” The reason for this is that assonance is much less visually obvious. Although the English language is quite free with the correspondence of spelling to sound, this […]
Continue ReadingDreams & Nightmares, Issues 74/75
Dreams & Nightmares issues 74 and 75 appear in one neatly put together double volume. Issue 74 is made up of eleven poems, while issue 75 has eleven poems and one piece of flash fiction.
“Lonely” by Greg Beatty is a love poem…or maybe an anti-love poem. Perhaps it’s best to describe […]
Breaking Hearts and Traffic Lights by Patrick Chapman
Patrick Chapman’s Breaking Hearts and Traffic Lights is a collection of poetry which functions as a continuous unit. If this were a piece of music, it would be a concept album. As the differences between songs and poems vary from vague to nonexistent, it should come as no surprise that this is a highly effective […]
Continue ReadingDistillations: Alliteration
As I mentioned last month, this column will be exploring various poetry techniques each month and how they are used in current speculative poetry. This month’s featured technique is alliteration, which is defined as the repetition of initial consonants or consonant sounds. It is a simple technique which can be powerful if not overdone. It […]
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