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” by Joanne Merriam is a story of misogyny taken to extreme levels. In twenty lines of first person (male) viewpoint we are told of the fate of the last documented woman. The narrator’s voice and wording are keys to the poem, and Merriam has done an excellent job of hinting to the readers much more of the story than the basic plot alone tells.

Because of that creature I’m a failure.
Imagine having to negotiate with one

just to get it to make you a child!

“Spring in Rutherford County” works well for me, and the last lines are very strong.

Gary Every’s slightly longer poem, “Letter To Mars,” starts out in a rambling manner by mentioning a few facts about Mars that seem somewhat unfocused. In all honesty, those first few lines are deceptive and lulled me into the feeling that I was being lectured to by a professor who had more bits of trivia at hand than he had the ability to organize. Of course, that rambling is only the lead into the poem’s main thrust, a number of opinions as to how the Martians might be contacted.

A Frenchman proposed
that we shape the sun’s rays
with a giant magnifying glass
and use this beam of light
to etch words upon the surface of the red planet.

Even these lines from well into the poem seem lecture-like and rather cold—but the poem culminates with a few lines that set all of the rest into sharp context. After the first reading I had to go back and read “Letter To Mars” multiple times, not from lack of understanding, but out of a deep appreciation for the poet’s skill in so gently and subtly setting up the ending.

“Riprap” by Neal Wilgus is a modern take on the Rip Van Winkle story. The first stanza of the poem seems set in our own time period and is mundane and comfortable in feel. The second catapults both narrator and reader into the future.

I woke 999 years later,
chilled to the bone,
thinking I’d left
the window open.

While the second stanza goes on to very briefly and concisely paint a picture of that strange new future, the third stanza, a single line, brilliantly places the viewpoint character’s fate in true perspective.

Looking back at my choices for this issue, I can see that in each case, in the poems that most appealed to me, the skilled use of viewpoint character voice has been central. This technique can lend a lot of depth to even very brief works, and it seems to be a strength found in many of the poems chosen for Dreams and Nightmares, which adds to the appreciation I have for the magazine.