Cover: Angel with Lyre © 1996 Kinuko Y. Craft
Editor: F.J. Bergmann
Layout: Robert Frazier & F.J. Bergmann
Production Manager: F.J. Bergmann
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Wyrms & Wormholes: New Leaves in Winter
Every now and then an incident will jolt my perspective. In my last day job, I was a clerk at a used-book store in Madison, Wisconsin, where politics has always been intrusive, but never more so than in recent years, in the wake of iniquitous policies implemented by the present state governor. During the height of the protests, one of the bookstore regulars came in, and I commented enthusiastically on the activism taking place. His face twisted with contempt—not because he opposed the position taken by the demonstrators, but because he felt their ethical priorities were skewed: on the scale of human awfulness, surely lying to fabricate a rationale for war and authorizing government-sanctioned, ongoing torture were far more vile than implementing comparatively petty changes to pay, benefits, and collective bargaining. Wasn’t it more important to call for the prosecution of warmongers and torturers who had done unconscionable harm to much greater numbers of people? He was right, of course, and I felt obscurely shamed instead of energized by my participation in those local protests. That kind of thinking, though, can easily become a trap, where its more determined practitioners end up not only unable to enjoy any aspect of their own lives, but feel compelled to prevent others from doing so as long as any suffering exists. Positive action, however slight, is still positive action—and for some, the absence of a negative may be the best they are capable of. Focus on what you can do.
Is poetry possible after Auschwitz—or, for that matter, Abu Ghraib? Is poetry the most important activity we could be engaging in as humans—as citizens of Terra? It is easy to take the position that literature and poetry (even political poetry) are trivial self-indulgences in the face of global atrocities and disasters, and that concentrating on aspects of grammar and presentation are even more shallow pursuits. However, time spent with poetry is, first of all, a peaceful pursuit: time spent in not doing harm to others. (Interestingly, poetry misused tends to fail.)
“If you’re not part of the solution …” is a facile criticism of non-involvement, but I do not believe that merely not doing harm is an insignificant goal. Secondly, the precision of expression that should be present in poetry—the best words, in their best order (and, let us hope, correctly spelled and punctuated, and permeated with syntactical clarity)—has a great deal to offer the world of diplomacy. Not a few treaties and negotiations have foundered on deficient wording. The niceties of grammar and precise diction are important for clear communication—a desperately needed skill in a world of conflicting cultures and traditions. Lastly, it is possible that the often elusive, allusive, evasive, metaphorical voice of poetry may touch hearts and minds that have made themselves impervious to more direct entreaties.
Robert Haas said, in his poem “Three Fair Branches from One Root Deriv’d,”
it is not a small thing to be
happily occupied.
Sometimes the small things are not small things. I wish for all of us in the coming year the necessary luxury of being happily—and harmlessly—occupied, and I believe that the enjoyment of speculative poetry, both in its reading and in its creation, will contribute to our cumulative happiness.Onward to a fabulous future,
—F.J. Bergmann, Star*Line Editor
Editor's Choice Poems
"The Captain Speaks," by Leslie J. Anderson
The computer reports the date and fills his glass.
It’s the future, but he’s too tired for it.
There were hardly any worlds
left to conquer, he moans. The computer
does not care. I stabbed flags into empty deserts
all my life. Then they were bulldozed, I guess.
Become a spaceman! they said. Adventure! Sex!
But no one says: oh, there aren’t actually
any alien civilizations to battle, didn’t we tell you?
No blue-scaled trollops to woo, or phosphorescent jaguars to shoot
with a heavy and beautiful laser gun. There is nothing
out here.
But once, some little thing
ran out of the sand. It was
clear and beautiful, like a ship of glass,
like a hermit crab—that size and
made of a million balanced pieces.
It was ornate. It was impossible.
I lowered my shaking pistol
and fired three shots into the ground
and it ran and ran …
"Because You Are an Expert in Such Matters," by Ron Czerwien
You were a failure as a close-up magician.
You could make the coins and the eggs
vanish, but could never make them reappear.
The flesh on your hands flows like quicksand.
So you pretend to be an invalid who must
be fed and dressed by others who come
to resent your neediness. One by one they
abandon you and are never seen again.
"why this weeping," by ayaz daryl nielsen
just a few phrases
from a species of
light years ago
the past dripping
from a hologram
"[their language …]," by Patrick Armstrong
their language sounds like knives
on bones; I’m glad
the translator’s dead
"Twilight Aeronauts," by Joshua Gage
We fairies fly on what you humans toss
away, wind through the wind on watch-gear wings
and ring the air with canterbury chimes.
The pretty fairies glamour eventide,
all flash and fancy, merry as a grig.
They tinker wings together from the scraps
of ornament they find—keys to journals
lined with secrets long forgot, the rust
laced hinges creaking as they flutter by,
the flowered handle of a christening spoon—
fallals and frills to fashion into flight.
The rest of us just pound our pinions out
of any spiky dross that we can nick—
shattered lorgnette lenses for their shine,
the nibs of stylographs stained black with ink,
the engine from a model train to steam
out stars and pump our avigations,
apothecary flasks, a morphine fiend’s
syringe. We barb ourselves against the teeth
of rats or pigeons guttering for meals.
We hide in shadow ’til the gaslight dims
then beat our way through fog and chimney smoke
to rise above your roofs and taste the sky.
Full Table of Contents
Departments
- Wyrms & Wormholes * F.J. Bergmann
- President’s Message • David C. Kopaska-Merkel
- From the Small Press • G.O. Clark, Joshua Gage, John Garrison, John Philip Johnson, David C. Kopaska-Merkel, Sandra J. Lindow, Stephen M. Wilson Full reviews
- Call for Rhysling Nominations
- Stealth SF • Denise Dumars
- Xenopoetry • Sofía Rhei; translation by Lawrence Schimel
Art
- Aliens Entwined • Richard H. Fay
- It Rises From the Ooze • Richard H. Fay
Poetry
- Sea Monkeys • Robert Borski
- The Truth about Unicorns • Beth Cato
- No Man’s a Mythic Hero to His Wife • Jason Braun
- “cold fingers” • Noel Sloboda
- The Captain Speaks • Leslie J. Anderson
- Dracula Considers Celebrity • Chris Bullard
- A Certain Kind of Spider • Ada Hoffmann
- Pantheon • Ruthanna Emrys
- Because You Are an Expert in Such Matters • Ron Czerwien
- Sagittarius • Glenn Meisenheimer
- Schrödinder’s Box • J.E. Stanley
- Virtual Barkeep • David C. Kopaska-Merkel
- blasé • Anna Sykora
- Slow Day on the River Styx • Robert Borski
- Passing Strange • Albert W. Grohmann
- de vermis nocturnis • David C. Kopaska-Merkel
- To the Higgs Boson • David M. Harris
- Green Wine of Xei Cambael • Wade German
- Interstellar Starship Bumper Stickers • Alan Ira Gordon
- Werewolf Baby • Ian Hunter
- A Hairy Issue • Beth Cato
- Extinct Species • Glenn Meisenheimer
- Flotsam • Brian Rosenberger
- Apocalypse Come, Apocalypse Go • Marge Simon
- “first” • C. William Hinderliter
- why this weeping • ayaz daryl nielsen
- “even at light speed …” • James Weaver
- Ambassador to the Abyss • Michael Kriesel
- Things We Learned • Glenn Meisenheimer
- Molluscan Nights at the Wheel’s Bright Core • David C. Kopaska-Merkel
- Breakup • Grace Seybold
- Effigy • Kim L. Neidigh
- Access: Denied • Lauren McBride
- “hangover and” • ayaz daryl nielsen
- “their language …” • Patrick Armstrong
- Twilight Aeronauts • Joshua Gage
- Freyja’s Might • Sandi Leibowitz
- “engines struggling” • Patrick Armstrong
- Future Creates a Prequel • Marc Dorpema
- “time travel made easy” • LeRoy Gorman
- Träumerei • Albert W. Grohmann
- Sawtooth Moon • Brian Rosenberger
- “gleaming hovercars” • Milo James Fowler
- “a worm flaps on razor wings” • Patrick Armstrong
- A Practical Guide to Cadet Safety • Simon Jacobs
- “hyperdrive hum …” • James Weaver
- A House is Not a Home • David C. Kopaska-Merkel
- “some have been” • David C. Kopaska-Merkel
- Without Which I Cannot Sleep • Matthew Wilson
- “abandoned starship” • Patrick Armstrong
- “separation …” • Dietmar Tauchner
- Love(s) Story • Aalix Roake