The Science Fiction Poetry Association has finalized its 2021 Rhysling Award candidates. One hundred six members nominated.
The Rhysling Award is given in two categories. “Best Long Poem” is for poems of 50+ lines, or for prose poems, of 500+ words. “Best Short Poem” is limited to poems of no more than 49 lines, or prose poems of no more than 499 words.
SFPA members have until June 15 to vote on the winners.
| Short Poems (103 poems) |
| “Summer Time(lessness)” • Linda D. Addison • Star*Line 43.4 |
| “Timegeddon” • Francis Wesley Alexander • Illumen, Spring |
| “The Void Blends in Your Hands” • Carmen Lucía Alvarado • Utopia Science Fiction, February |
| “The Tree Of Eyes” • Colleen Anderson • Literary Hatchet 26 |
| “They Made My Face” • Sara Backer • Silver Blade 47 |
| “Sealskin Reclaimed” • Alison Bainbridge • Glitchwords 2 |
| “a siren whispered in my ear one night” • Ashley Bao • Arsenika 7 |
| “Chrono-Man” • F. J. Bergmann • Polu Texni, May 11 |
| “Lesser Eternity” • F. J. Bergmann • Survision Magazine 6 |
| “Chronovisor Wanted” • Robert Borski • Star*Line 43.1 |
| “The Monster Maker” • Bruce Boston • Silver Blade 45 |
| “When Change Comes” • Karen Bovenmyer • Arcana: Story |
| “The Edge of Galaxy NGC 4013” • Warren Brown • Speculative North 3 |
| “He Sold What He Had Left” • Diane Callahan • Speculative North 1 |
| “Three Triolets” • Anna Cates • Strange Horizons, 7 December |
| “Mrs. Housekeeper” • Beth Cato • Eye To The Telescope 35 |
| “The Luck Eaters” • Beth Cato & Rhonda Parrish • Star*Line 43.3 |
| “Post-Obit Cautionary Tale” • G. O. Clark • Tales From the Moonlight Path, July |
| “Zodiac Girl” • Carolyn Clink • Eye to the Telescope 36 |
| “Back Story” • David Clink • Strange Horizons, 12 September 2020 |
| “The dead couple of Blenheim” • William Clunie • Dreams and Nightmares 116 |
| “an alien axiom” • Gerald L. Coleman • Star*Line 43.4 |
| “Mouthing off” • PS Cottier • Monstrous (IP, Brisbane, Australia) |
| “The Memory of Summer” • Jennifer Crow • Polu Texni, May 31 |
| “The Old God Dies” • Jennifer Crow • Liminality 24 |
| “The Man with the Corpse on His Shoulders” • James Cushing • Rattle, October 1, 2020 |
| “Isotropical” • d’Ores&Deja • Analog, July/August |
| “A Hand Against My Window” • Deborah L. Davitt • 34 Orchard 1 |
| “A Touch of Lightning in the Soul” • Deborah L. Davitt • Abyss & Apex 73 |
| “The Witch’s Cat” • Deborah L. Davitt • Eye to the Telescope 38 |
| “Beneath the Fullest Moon” • Ashley Dioses • Midnight Under the Big Top, ed. Brian James Freeman (Cemetery Dance Publications) |
| “Disassembly at auction” • Robin Wyatt Dunn • Mobius: The Journal of Social Change 31:4 |
| “Dragons Guard Our Family Fortune” • Adele Gardner • Star*Line 43.2 |
| “Last Contact” • Jean-Paul L. Garnier • Poetry Super Highway, December 28 |
| “The Mollusk God” • Maxwell Ian Gold • Space & Time Magazine 139 |
| “Tree Limbs Block the Road” • Patricia Gomes • Wicked Women: An Anthology by New England Horror Writers, ed. Trisha Wooldridge |
| “Lucky & His Dad” • Alan Ira Gordon • Illumen Spring |
| “The Crib” • Vince Gotera • Making the Novel, August |
| “A Soldier Writes His Wife” • Vince Gotera • Ribbons 16:2 |
| “First Contact“ • Robin Rose Graves • Simultaneous Times 6 |
| “Teddy Bear Diner” • Michael H. Hanson • Android Girl and Other Sentient Speculations (Three Ravens Publishing) |
| “Hungry Ghost” • Millie Ho • Uncanny 33 |
| “Ignorance, my prophylactic” • Akua Lezli Hope • Eye to the Telescope 38 |
| “Dolly Waits” • Juleigh Howard-Hobson • Final Cut Zine, October 31 |
| “That is not what I meant at all” • Brian Hugenbruch • Abyss & Apex 76 |
| “‘Flee’—The Last Dispatch from the Jemison Station” • Maya C. James • Star*Line 43.4 |
| “Requiem” • Clay F. Johnson • Nightingale & Sparrow 8 |
| “Form Factor” • Tim Jones • Eye To The Telescope 38 |
| “Family Historian” • Herb Kauderer • Scifaikuest, August |
| “Cave Painting” • Oliver Keane • Eternal Haunted Summer, Winter Solstice |
| “Posle Nas” • Rosalie Morales Kearns • Apparition Lit 11 |
| “Star Trip(tych)” • M. X. Kelly • Speculative North 2 |
| “Witching” • Erin Kirsh • Speculative North 2 |
| “Life Goes On” • David C Kopaska-Merkel • Anwen 107 |
| “We sell skin on sale” • Rachel Lachmansingh • Augur Magazine 3.2 |
| “The Forest in the Full of the Moon” • Geoffrey A. Landis • New Myths, December |
| “Snow White and the Seven Deadly Sins” • Geoffrey A. Landis • Space & Time Magazine, May |
| “The Cat’s Epilogue” • Mary Soon Lee • The Sign of the Dragon (JABberwocky Literary Agency) |
| “Cavall” • Mary Soon Lee • Asimov’s Science Fiction, September/October |
| “What Phoenixes Read” • Mary Soon Lee • Star*Line 43.3 |
| “Darning” • Sandra J. Lindow • Asimov’s Science Fiction, May/June |
| “Rapunzel at Seventy” • Sandra J. Lindow • Taj Mahal Review, June |
| “Grass Whisperer” • Lynne M MacLean • Speculative North 1 |
| “Lovely Ludwig Van” • Alessandro Manzetti • Space & Time 139 |
| “Kings and Queens of Narnia” • Meep Matsushima • Octavos 9/24/2020 |
| “Black Water, Black Bones” • Michelle Muenzler • Liminality 23 |
| “Libations” • Soonest Nathaniel • FIYAH 15 |
| “Cento for Lagahoos” • Brandon O’Brien • Uncanny 36 |
| “Mountain” • Cindy O’Quinn • Shelved: Appalachian Resilience Amid Covid-19 (Mountain Gap Books anthology) |
| “You Were With Me” • CIndy O’Quinn • Space & Time Magazine 136 |
| “The Krakeness” • K. A. Opperman • Cosmic Horror Monthly, June |
| “On the Edge of Forever” • Josh Pearce • Star*Line 43.1 |
| “Fin” • Terese Mason Pierre • Uncanny 36 |
| “Like Clockwork” • Christina M. Rau • Songs of Eretz Poetry Review, March |
| “Bar Scene” • John Reinhart • Star*Line 43.3 |
| “It Feels Like Drowning” • Terrie Leigh Relf • HWA Poetry Showcase Vol. VII, ed. Stephanie Wytovich |
| “fear of police, but as sci-fi, because /that/ you can understand -or, less passive aggressively- get these fucking phasers out of my face” • J. C. Rodriguez • Freeze Ray Poetry 19 |
| “invocation of my guardian angel in six sexts” • Camille Rosas • Eye to the Telescope 37 |
| “Arrival Mind” • Louis B. Rosenberg • Arrival Mind (Outland Publishing) |
| “Of fairy tales—” • David F. Shultz • Star*Line 43.1 |
| “People Dropping Dead in the Mall Parking Lot” • lan Ray Simmons • Abyss & Apex 76 |
| “Journey’s End” • Marge Simon • Silver Blade 46 |
| “Old Playfellow” • Noel Sloboda • Abyss & Apex 75 |
| “Riding the Exhale” • Angela Yuriko Smith • HWA Poetry Showcase Vol. VII, ed. Stephanie Wytovich |
| “The Deer” • Christina Sng • A Collection of Dreamscapes (Raw Dog Screaming Press) |
| “Dream Weaver” • Blaize Kelly Strothers • Apparition Lit 12 |
| “The Selkie Wife” • Marcie Lynn Tentchoff • Speculative North 3 |
| “Andromeda’s Lament” • Gretchen Tessmer • Liminality 26 |
| “End Credits” • Gretchen Tessmer • Liquid Imagination 44 |
| “A Tempest” • Sheree Renée Thomas • Star*Line 43.4 |
| “Why did white people conquer the world for spices and then never use them?” • R. Thursday • Drunk Monkeys, November 16 |
| “King Pest” • Richard L. Tierney • Spectral Realms 13 |
| “Athena Holds Up a Mirror to Strength” • Ali Trotta • Uncanny 34 |
| “Persephone’s Sneakers” • Amanda Trout • Little Death Lit 5 |
| “Extinction No. 6” • Morgan L. Ventura • Augur 3.2 |
| “Unlooping” • Marie Vibbert • Asimov’s Science Fiction, January/February |
| “Acacia” • Holly Lyn Walrath • Liminality 24 |
| “we are all energy” • M. Darusha Wehm • Kaleidotrope, Spring |
| “The Paper Effigies Shop” • Deborah Wong • Eye to the Telescope 36 |
| [hand-me-down] • Greer Woodward • Eye to the Telescope 35 |
| Long Poems (65 poems) |
| “And It Was Bad” • Anne Carly Abad • Abyss & Apex 75 |
| “The Looking Glass” • Colleen Anderson • Illumen, Spring |
| “Snow White’s Apples” • Colleen Anderson • Polu Texni, April 14 |
| “Time Traveller’s Memory” • Davian Aw • The Future Fire 55 |
| “Regarding” • F. J. Bergmann • Polu Texni, March 30 |
| “The Riches of Cloud Country” • Ruth Berman • Asimov’s Science Fiction, May/June |
| “Eleven exhibits in a better Natural History Museum, London” • Jenny Blackford • Strange Horizons, 14 September |
| “The priestess’s daughter” • Jenny Blackford • Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, February |
| “The Third Sister” • Andrea Blythe • Twelve (Interstellar Flight Press) |
| “Parabiont” • Robert Borski • Dreams and Nightmares 115 |
| “Devilish Incarnations” • Bruce Boston • Star*Line 43.1 |
| “Wishes” • Jennifer Bushroe • Polu Texni, September 7 |
| “Learning the Way” • Sarah Cannavo • Liminality 25 |
| “My Cat, He” • Beth Cato • Uncanny 36 |
| “Cursebody” • May Chong • Apparition Lit 11 |
| “Municipal Ghosts” • May Chong • Eye to the Telescope 36 |
| “La Bête: The Beast of Gévaudan” • Frank Coffman • Black Flames & Gleaming Shadows (Bold Venture Press) |
| “The Wheel of the Year” • Frank Coffman • Black Flames & Gleaming Shadows (Bold Venture Press) |
| “The Imp and the Bottle” • Sharon Cote • Star*Line 43.2 |
| “The King of Eyes” • PS Cottier • Monstrous (IP, Brisbane, Australia) |
| “Twisted Sayings” • Ashley Dioses • The Withering (Jackanapes Press) |
| “After the Decipherment” • FJ Doucet • SFPA Poetry Contest |
| “Penelope, the truth” • Clarabelle Fields • Corvid Queen, April 3, 2020 |
| “The Mad Scientist to the Muse of her Dreams” • Adele Gardner • Dreams and Nightmares 114 |
| “Odysseus Grins at Fate and the Gods” • Adele Gardner • Mithila Review 13 |
| “Seven Steps to Reach Your Father Across the Great Divide” • Adele Gardner • Liminality 25 |
| “Cellars, Caskets, and Closets” • Maxwell I. Gold • Baffling Magazine 1 |
| “The Secret Ingredient is Always the Same” • Sarah Grey • Fantasy Magazine 61 |
| “Fermi’s Spaceship” • Jamal Hodge • Star*Line 43.4 |
| “Igbo Landing” • Akua Lezli Hope • Penumbra, Fall 2020 |
| “First Turn” • Juleigh Howard-Hobson • Final Cut Zine, October 31 |
| “The Finger” • Abi Hynes • Dreams and Nightmares 114 |
| “An Offering” • Michael Janairo • Line of Advance (2020 Col. Darron L. Wright Memorial Awards) |
| “The Emerald Witch Stone” • Clay F. Johnson • Moonchild Magazine, January |
| “The First Dragon” • Herb Kauderer • Altered Reality Magazine, 14 December |
| “The Unicorn Insane” • Herb Kauderer • Speculations II: Poetry from the Weird Poets’ Society, ed. Frank Coffman |
| “Dictionary of the Lost” • Luke Kernan • Déraciné 7 |
| “Robo sapiens Thinks He Thinks” • Geoffrey A. Landis • Eye To The Telescope 35 |
| “Ford” • Mary Soon Lee • The Sign of the Dragon (JABberwocky Literary Agency) |
| “Jumble” • Mary Soon Lee • Heroic Fantasy Quarterly 43 |
| “Two Weeks” • Mary Soon Lee • The Sign of the Dragon (JABberwocky Literary Agency) |
| “Invisible Ink” • Gerri Leen • Community of Magic Pens (Atthis Arts anthology) |
| “Social Graces” • Lori R. Lopez • Bewildering Stories 871 |
| “The Whistle Stop” • Lori R. Lopez • Impspired 8 |
| “The Son-in-Law from Hell” • LindaAnn LoSchiavo • Bewildering Stories 875 |
| “Budapest: for Lianne” • S. Qiouyi Lu • In Charge Magazine, June 4 |
| “Alice” • Alessandro Manzetti • Whitechapel Rhapsody (Independent Legions) |
| “the cage” • Alessandro Manzetti • Midnight Under the Big Top, ed. Brian James Freeman (Cemetery Dance Publications) |
| “The Believers” • Meep Matsushima • Strange Horizons, 21 December |
| “Nephele, On Friday” • Elizabeth R. McClellan • Air: Sylphs, Spirits & Swan Maidens, ed. Rhonda Parrish (Tyche Books) |
| “There Must Be Blood” • Elizabeth R. McClellan • Rejection Letters, October 8 |
| “lagahoo culture (Part I)” Brandon O’Brien • Uncanny 35 |
| “Mise-en-scène” • Suphil Lee Park • Michigan Quarterly—Mixtape: Apocalypse issue |
| “Next!” • Michael Payne • Silver Blade 47 |
| “Caged” • Marsheila Rockwell • American Diversity Report, December 16 |
| “Our Lady of the Archerontia” • Allan Rozinski • Spectral Realms 13 |
| “Such Monstrous Births” • Emily Smith • Strange Horizons, 9 March |
| “All that I have lost” • Christina Sng • A Collection of Dreamscapes (Raw Dog Screaming Press) |
| “Dark Forest” • Christina Sng • New Myths 53 |
| “Hansel and Gretel” • Christina Sng • A Collection of Dreamscapes (Raw Dog Screaming Press) |
| “Love Song of the Swamp” • Alena Sullivan • Crow & Cross Keys, December |
| “A Song from Bedlam (with apologies to Christopher Smart)” • Nike Sulway • Liminality 23 |
| “A Dish Best Served” • Lisa Timpf• Liminality 23 |
| “Daughters Saving Mothers” • Holly Lyn Walrath • Liminality 23 |
Update 02/24/21: The poems by Marianne Boruch, Cynthia Cozette, Joshua Gage and Hazel Lee have been removed from the Rhysling candidates page after being withdrawn by the authors.
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