Online Issue Contents

• Wyrms & Wormholes

• Editor's Choice Poems
  • Human Laughter by Ciarán Parkes
  • Digital Desire by A J Dalton
  • Creamed Corn by H. Russell Smith
  • FourthMass-Market Affair by Casey Aimer

• Full Table of Contents

---

Wyrms & Wormholes: Diffuse

Do you ever find yourself stumped about what to write? And do you get sick of staring at a screen? I do, and I’m pretty sure that every writer faces this problem from time to time. As with most problems, the answer often lies with diffuse thinking. When we look away from a problem the answer will sometimes present itself, similar to the way that being outside of one’s general environment will force forgotten memories to surface. I frequently speak to writers who are struggling to find clarity and can think of nothing but their manuscript. It’s easy to get mired in the work and lose sight of the big picture. Because of this, I almost always suggest doing something that has nothing to do with writing, preferably outdoors and physical, or with your hands (if possible), or to take a deep dive into an unrelated field, something that you think will not interest you. Pretty much everything is interesting if you scratch beneath the surface, and solutions to problems can often be found by looking at how another field has addressed similar issues. I once answered a writing question by picking up a camera and doing a series of photographs about a related topic. Sometimes the answer can be found while in the hypnogogic state between waking and sleep. Step away from the work if you have to, infuse yourself with new information, or simply relax. The answers will come, so be kind to yourself.

—Jean-Paul L. Garnier, Star*Line Editor

---

Editor's Choice Poems

"Human Laughter" by Ciarán Parkes

Up in their space ships, the aliens are
trying to make a glossary for
what they’ve recognised as the dominant
human language on the planet, these

bursts and howls and sputterings
of what we would call laughter. They quickly
dismissed every human tongue
as being too local, idiosyncratic. Laughter

happened everywhere. The powerful
seemed to practice it more. They could
see it pass from person to person
in small or large groups. Its sound

conjured up fear, irrationality, aggression,
traits that seemed particularly human
to the watching aliens. They were puzzled
by its relative poverty of sound types

then realised the gestures humans made,
and their various grimaces were also
a part of language. Finally, they descended
in their bright machines, carefully waving

claws and tentacles, transmitting
the sound of human laughter everywhere,
millions of them, all of them trying
to communicate. It was no laughing matter

---

"Digital Desire," by A J Dalton

Lonely killer robot
Would like to meet
Similar
With weapons deactivated
For quiet nights in
On the sofa
Processing visual data
Taking on lubricoolants™
And recharging.
Not averse to intricacy
And mutual recalibration.
Fully updated but not concerned
By model or series gaps.
Owners of pet species welcome,
As long as they are trained.
No sense of humour required.
Would like to travel
and maybe one day build
an army

---

"Creamed Corn," by H. Russell Smith

I am the creamed corn of
Mathematical misadventure
Splayed on a plate
Next to toxic lettuce salad
Glowing in hazy, dim
Cafeteria light.
Tomatoes, like me,
Well past their prime numbers
Vulnerable green onions
Drowning in skunky salad dressing
I count the grids in the drop ceiling.
Similarly disheartened patrons
Pray the manager won’t
Extort them for full price.
Soggy buns work as jelly cushions for
Shoe-leather chicken sandwiches.
I feel myself drifting, spreading thin
While heat drains away
Sticking to the plate,
Licking some burger abomination
Like an annoying neighbor dog
Leaving slobbers on melted cheese.
Square. Round. Pi.
It’s a ratio used on these rations
Probably canned by a medieval monk
In the silence of night
During a locust plague
The usual, you know.
How many?
Should we use scientific notation?
How do you do that in Roman numerals?
Scathed by an errant fork
A fry meets its death
Three tables over.
No one comes to take pictures
Of the ketchup spatter.
Minus one.
Minus two.
A few are left in the basket.
Far less than my number of kernels.
Waiter! Bring the check

---

"Mass-Market Affair," by Casey Aimer

Advertisements fell from my mouth
in place of hello on our first date.

Our charismas and chemistry mixed until
our shared hobbies accrued an interest
maturing into a continuing passion.
Soon the wine bottle’s condensation
revealed discount codes for another.

The logos comprising and forming her skin
subsidies from my same conglomerates,
promising signs for our micro-enterprise
others would relabel and reclassify as love.

That night she held out illuminated palms
pulsing colored barcodes. My smart-eye
scanned them and her company sent me
videos of two teens sharing a single piece
of branded chewing gum and falling in love.

She kissed me, leaving a heat stamp
on my cheek. Fires grew within me
as it absorbed, until I was encircled
in this exquisitely sponsored moment.

Our world does hold love, but no
direct expression of it. Human
interactions replaced by façades
of products. Money no longer talks,
endorsements shout on our behalf.

Our courtship was an endorsement, worthy
of its own commercial, our love languages
becoming brand affiliated. She was a foot-
hold in my brain—couldn’t stop thinking
about her without bankrupting myself.

I proposed to her with a branded brochure
broadcasting our awaiting getaway, how we
would soon merge our brands and hearts.

At our wedding I began reciting my vows
but a promoted Insta poet spoke instead.
My bride smiled, both her curving lips
sponsored by a startup lipstick company.

---

Full Table of Contents

Departments

• Wyrms & Wormholes * Jean-Paul Garnier
• SFPA Announcements
• President’s Message * Colleen Anderson
• From the Small Press * John Reinhart, Lisa Timpf
• Stealth SF * “The Gloves Come Off, Part I” * Denise Dumars
• SpecPo Publishing * Interview with Casey Aimer * Jean-Paul Garnier
• Xenopoetry * Werwolf/Werewolf * F.J. & Fred W. Bergman

Art

• Struggle for the Starbox by Austin Arthur Hart
• Galaxy Eye by Denny E. Marshall
• Melting by Jade Sng
• Vault by Denny E. Marshall
• Attack of the Missile Robots by Denny E. Marshall

Poetry

• The Dream-Ships of the Yser * Goran Lowie
• Headlines from Utopia * Lynne Sargent
• Gods of the Landfill * Pedro Iniguez
• The Alien Words, Formed and Empty * Daniel Ausema
• I didn’t know the lights … * Richard Magahiz
• Time Crystals * F. J. Bergmann
• Personal Demons * Mary Soon Lee
• Halogenorium * Miguel O. Mitchell
• Rita Levi-Montalcini (1909–2012) * Jessy Randall
• Ravages of Time * F. J. Bergmann
• Acrylic Beads * David C. Kopaska-Merkel & Kendall Evans
• Ode to aerogel * Richard Magahiz
• Foaming * Mahaila Smith
• Greetings from the Future! * Jason P. Burnham
• Our Past * Timons Esaias
• [feeling] * Christina Sng
• [starless sky] * Ryan J. M. Tan
• [lightspeed travel] * Lisa Timpf
• Gorgon Restricted * Gerri Leen
• Multi-Species Spacecraft Crew Consensus * John H. Dromey
• Preserved * X. S. Aaron
• [Zombie get-together sucks] * Alan Ira Gordon
• Human Laughter * Ciarán Parkes
• Surrealia #16 * Miguel O. Mitchell
• [Alpha Centaurians] * LeRoy Gorman
• microcosm * Russell Nichols
• My Grotesque Treasure * Abi Marie Palmer
• Scattered * Devan Barlow
• 4-D Mirror * Francis W. Alexander
• The Permanence of Stone * Beth Cato & Rhonda Parrish
• [Chrononauts! Objects] * Howard V. Hendrix
• Digital Desire * A J Dalton
• [plein air] * Ann K. Schwader
• Things I Should’ve Told You * Bill Abbott
• Carcinisation * Richard Magahiz
• The Curator of Curses * LindaAnn LoSchiavo
• [religious robots] * Randall Andrews
• Gemini * Jean-Marie Romana
• Death Idle * Soren James
• Kalanchoe daigremontiana * Marisca Pichette
• Mnemosyne * Devan Barlow
• Ice and Fire * Roger Dutcher
• Borne on a Hundred Wings * Anna Madden
• Emissaries * Ann K. Schwader & David C. Kopaska-Merkel
• Some Things Never Change * Marsheila Rockwell
• The Spider Invasion * Kendall Evans
• [The dryad waits] * Sarah Cannavo
• A Catalog of Shade * Jennifer Crow
• Prairie In The Sky * Robert Frazier
• Blow out the Candles * Cassandra Blomberg
• Heirs of Wickedness * Roger Dutcher
• The Ones Who Stayed * Goran Lowie
• [frozen corpses] * Sarah Das Gupta
• [zombie yoga] * Lauren McBride
• five o’clock traffic * D. A. Xiaolin Spires
• The Year It Changed * David C. Kopaska-Merkel
• [A mouth awaited] * Debby Feo
• Bottom of the Jar * Beth Cato
• You Can’t Keep Bananas on Saturn * Brian U. Garrison
• Creamed Corn * H. Russell Smith
• Photosynthesis * Eva Papasoulioti
• The Princess and the Peewee * PS Cottier
• Mass-Market Affair * Casey Aimer
• UAP * Wendy Van Camp
• Next Time * F. J. Bergmann
• Bossa Nova in the Blues Bar on Blue Mars * Libby Graham
• They call us brethren monsters * Ngo Binh Anh Khoa
• A New Mythology * Dawn Vogel
• [Kong plucks] * Dennis Maulsby
• [woodsmoke …] * Greg Schwartz
• hospitable * Lorraine Schein
• How Ironic * John H. Dromey
• [a soldier bleeding out] * Royal Baysinger
• [warning! Earth is not] * Howard V. Hendrix
• Wandering Star * Rick A. Pearson
• [in a dark bazaar] * Barun Saha
• end in sight * Benjamin Whitney Norris