Scifaikuest
FEBRUARY 2021 ONLINE
EDITORIAL
Happy Valentine's Day!
Our DOOR artwork is Night of the Comet by talented artist and poet, Christina Sng!
This month we have two articles in this ONLINE issue, and four articles in the PRINT edition! We've also got two poetic forms that are new to Scifaikuest. For information on subscriptions to Scifaikuest, please see below.
ATTENTION!!!
Scifaikuest finally has its own ISBN!!! Please inform your local bookstores and library that they are now able to ORDER SCIFAIKUEST!!!
If you don’t have a subscription to our PRINT edition, they are available at: https://www.hiraethsffh.com/product-page/scifaikuest
And, if you would like to join the select group of contributors by submitting your poetry, artwork or article, you can find our guidelines at: https://www.hiraethsffh.com/scifaikuest
I'd like to thank our newest contributor, Juleigh Howard-Hobson. Welcome to Scifaikuest!
stuck in transit
late Christmas early Valentine
gifts sent from Earth
-sakyu-
***
SCIFAIKU
round trip
a round trip to Mars
NASA brought them back
in body bags
Benjamin Whitney Norris
***
case closed
your clone's DNA
but they don't care--
how's life on death row?
Benjamin Whitney Norris
***
Hope
space is cold and vast
anything could be out there
we go anyway
Juleigh Howard-Hobson
***
chaos yawns
already ravenous
the stars are ripe
Josh Maybrook
***
time travel rehab
no time
like no time
LeRoy Gorman
***
dusk on a distant planet
pathogens call in
their offspring
LeRoy Gorman
***
in the green temple
of a deep forest meadow
bowing to aliens
ayaz daryl nielsen
***
fondness for cats
even the aliens
are not immune
Christina Sng
***
mesmerized
by the spinning fan
baby alien’s first day on earth
Christina Sng
***
pavlov’s bell
summons me to feed
blood moon
Christina Sng
***
unexpected find
in alien greenhouse
my family tree
Guy Belleranti
***
liftoff problem
wish gravity was the cause
instead of those claws
Guy Belleranti
***
the speed
she leaves by
FTL
Thomas Tilton
***
nuclear wasteland
running into cockroaches
bigger than my car
Ngo Binh Anh Khoa
***
"Police Auction"
diamond thief apprehended
tools of trade for sale
carbon shrinking ray
Matthew Wilson
***
"Beware Postman"
Beware of pet
off her leash
will puncture space suit
Matthew Wilson
***
"Re-entry Fail"
fuel depletion
wishing for self-destruct button
to save millions below
Matthew Wilson
***
relativity
light speed media
up to the second newsbeats
years after the fact
Herb Kauderer
***
enchanted forest
the vagrant’s makeshift home
shapeshifts to a condo
Francis W. Alexander
*
Virgo -
he forms the heart
from Martian soil
Francis W. Alexander
***
hungry dinosaur
wondering if
I’ll reach the gun in time
Stephen C. Curro
***
wind in my ears
freefalling
aboard a pterosaur
Stephen C. Curro
***
beams across the void
voices reach out: the stars
distant no longer
Banks Miller
***
SENRYU
podiatrist’s waiting room…
I should have
washed my hooves
ayaz daryl nielsen
***
martian boardroom
the heated debate
on plans drawn against us
William Shaw
***
shapeshifter
throws fitness fit at the gym
he's still out of shape
Guy Belleranti
***
HAY(NA)KU
luring
she swoons
husband prey captured
Colleen Anderson
***
HORRORKU
winter dawn
a trail of entrails
stains the snow
Ngo Binh Anh Khoa
***
good humor man
anything but good
delivers ice screams
Guy Belleranti
***
the hired mourner
after the first death
drying her tears
on necrotic tissue
Benjamin Whitney Norris
***
bald lies
fresh scalp in one hand
bloody knife in the other
doe-eyed ingenue
Benjamin Whitney Norris
***
TANKA
battle and pain
lost in fire and blood
alone a ghost
return again to haunt
the powers that betray me
Doug Gant
***
entrepreneurship
the necromancer opens
a new factory
dirt-cheap labor recruited
from within newly dug graves
Ngo Binh Anh Khoa
***
bubbles
in the holding tank
I think I’m alone
until the monster
opens its eyes
Stephen C. Curro
***
long after
the river beds dry
the martians crawl out
from underground
towards mars station one
Christina Sng
***
piano concert intermission
my wife and I agree
the alien musician's performance
enhanced by having
12 fingers
John J. Dunphy
***
RICTAMETER
Falling
Down to darkness
A dead star’s hungry grave
Through space tight curved, I see myself
Accelerating as a frozen wave –
A particle, perhaps, or both!
Aglow with joy, I find
Up to light I’m
Falling.
Doug Gant
For an explanation of this poetic form, you can read one in our PRINT edition at:
***
HAIBUN
The Valentine’s Day Invasion Haibun
Francis W. Alexander
Here and there the aliens shot the humans. No human was safe. It didn’t matter if it was a small town or a large city. Whether the victim was a Communist or Capitalist; Democrat, Republican, or Independent; Black, White, or Yellow. Humans were struck indiscriminately. Frantically, mankind struck back. The earthlings who escaped, nuked the alien ships and killed every alien they could find.
first day of spring
scientists discover humans shot
with alien love potions
***
ARTICLES
The Keyhole
Robert E. Porter
For a while there, my life was falling apart and I couldn’t read any fiction. I’d put it down as soon as I picked it up, put off by something in the opening lines. It smelled fishy to me. Fake. That’s a novel or short story for you. Sometimes it will bail you out, or sink you; other times, it will float on by like a turd in the swimming pool. I sought out Kenneth Rexroth’s translations of haiku instead, or Philip Larkin’s poems, or a Get Fuzzy comic strip. I couldn’t get into the Post or the Times – articles written too close to the Times I was living in, or the Post I was tied to. But I devoured Peter Ackroyd’s short biographies (of Newton, Wilkie Collins, or Chaucer) for the Canaletto-like distance and perspective they gave me.
GK Chesterton’s autobiography was a slower read but carried me along with the tour-de-force of a steampunk engine. In the photograph on the cover, the man looks more like a member of my own family than I do. That round face, that round body, those eyes, that droopy mustache, that expression. His deepest thoughts and rolling thunderous sense of humor seemed even more familiar. I never could read one of his Father Brown stories; Chesterton’s own story wasn’t nearly so cozy. What I liked best was his unrelenting optimism in the face of whatever dead man’s curves life threw at him. He stayed on track. He always seemed to be looking around the bend, down the row of houses, to the grassy plain, where he would stand alone.
“For nobody else specializes in that mystical mood in which the yellow star of the dandelion is startling, being something unexpected and undeserved. There are philosophies as varied as the flowers of the field, and some of them weeds and a few of them poisonous weeds. But they none of them create the psychological conditions in which I first saw, or desired to see, the flower.” (Chesterton, p. 329)
I don’t know what this had to do with his Roman Catholicism, or the genesis of Father Brown; his overwrought explanations drowned in the Buddha’s flower sermon. Chesterton pretended not to take his fictions seriously, and he took a perverse pride in sticking up for people, like spiritual mediums, or Boers, in the face of popular disdain or rabid, rabble-rousing jingoism.
Is your mind so small that you have to fall
in with the pack wherever they run? (Iommi)
There was his optimism, shining through the darkest passages, or the obscurest prose, and I liked this part of him best; it resembled me, or rather how I’d see myself -- if only I had the moral courage to cut away the waste and expose my bones to the light.
That’s the power of minimalism. And it puts us at risk. How much can we afford to leave out and still be understood? If it goes without saying, it should not remain in the final draft. But it so often does, betraying a poet’s lack of confidence in himself and his audience, or his belief that plot holes in a narrative could be covered up by more digging, or that the blind spots and floaters in his vision removed by gouging. Kenneth Rexroth, on the other hand, tried to keep haiku pared down to the essential.
“Often the translator has simply expanded the poem, relaxed its concentration, usually into platitude,” he said. “This is all too easy to do, because Japanese poetry depends first of all on the subtlety of its effects. It is a poetry of sensibility. If these effects are extended and diluted, the sensibility easily degenerates into sentimentality.” (Rexroth, p. IX)
It seems paradoxical to associate Chesterton with subtlety and minimalism, considering the man’s girth, the length and complexity of his sentences, or the Juggernaut of his arguments; but there it is -- like hanging some article of faith on the scaffolding of internal contradictions, or sending a footpad rocketing toward Enlightenment with the koan lifted from the back of a Crackerjack box. Chesterton’s earliest memory was of a puppet play put on by his father, who had also constructed the little stage and set.
“All my life,” he said, “I have loved frames and limits; and I will maintain that the largest wilderness looks larger seen through a window. To the grief of all grave dramatic critics, I will still assert that the perfect drama must strive to rise to the higher ecstasy of the peep-show. I have also a pretty taste in abysses and bottomless chasms and everything else that emphasises [sic] a fine shade of distinction between one thing and another; and the warm affection I have always felt for bridges is connected with the fact that the dark and dizzy arch accentuates the chasm even more than the chasm itself.” (Chesterton, p41)
When he was older, he walked through the city of London at night fascinated by darkened alleyways, closed doors, and cracks in the curtains. Chesterton wondered about all the lives being lived and ripper-Jacketed there behind the scenes, glimpsed through a keyhole, as it were. He saw through the costumed, scripted performances put on in the street by sneering mobs and jingoists, too. Now I wonder if it is the keyhole (or ku) that focuses and hones our interest in the genuine, or if it is only those interested in the genuine who look through that keyhole, can be startled by the dandelion, or savor a ku.
Works Cited
Chesterton, G.K. The Autobiography of G.K. Chesterton. Ignatius Press, 2006.
Iommi, Tony. “After Forever.” Master of Reality. Warner Bros. Records, 1971.
Rexroth, Kenneth. One Hundred Poems from the Japanese. New Directions, 1964.
***
A Review of William Landis'
The Miseducation of the Androids
t. santitoro
Thoughtful and compelling, this book of poetic verse underscores the possible nature of robotic interaction with humans, and oftentimes appears to be a metaphor for human relationships throughout the eons, as well.
Landis' use of haibun and scifaiku to create his stories of the future, clearly expresses his vision of a time when robots have evolved enough to possess emotions which countermand their programming. His choice of both poetic forms to convey this idea, makes for poignant tales which are quickly read, but which will provoke the Reader's sense of compassion with comparative concepts of the lives of the enslaved AIs.
This book is not only a poignant commentary of human social issues, but also an interesting collection of poetry that mirrors our own hopes of intellectual revolution and enlightenment.
You can find William Landis' The Miseducation of the Androids at:
https://www.hiraethsffh.com/product-page/miseducation-of-the-androids-by-william-landis
***
FAVORITE POEM
by t.santitoro, editor
hungry dinosaur
wondering if
I’ll reach the gun in time
--Stephen C. Curro
A heart-pounding scene, all in three lines! Great work!
***
WHO?
Francis W. Alexander: The five-time Rhysling nominee is the author of When the Mushrooms Come and I Reckon. He is a frequent contributor to Scifaikuest.
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Stephen C. Curro: "Stephen is a total nerd from Windsor, Colorado. Along with Scifaikuest, he has published or forthcoming work with Acorn and The Fifth Di..., among others. He also writes educational materials for the nonprofit Taproot Guru. When he isn't writing, he works as a high school paraprofessional. When he isn't working, he enjoys scuba diving and plotting to trick his dad into watching Lord of the Rings. You can keep up with his shenanigans at www.stephenccurro.com."
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John Dunphy is one of our original contributors, and we're so glad he keeps on sending us his awesome poetry!
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Doug Gant has been an avid reader of science fiction, fantasy, and horror for many decades. His interest in folktales and mythology, along with his background in mathematics, allows him to meld the mystic and the analytic.
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Juleigh Howard-Hobson lives in the rural Pacific Northwest, where the sky is too often cloud filled. But, when it's not...wow...outer space looks huge. And inspiring. Her work can be found in Star*Line, Illumen, Eye to the Telescope, Dreams & Nightmares, Polu Texni and other fine sci fi venues.
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Herb Kauderer is a retired Teamster who grew up to be an English professor at Hilbert College. Stranger things have happened.
***
Banks Miller: I grew up on the third planet of a G2-class star in the spiral arm of ... um, I mean, in the Houston area and graduated from Texas A&M with a Biology degree. I currently work in Fort Worth in the environmental industry. A lifetime love of science, SF, and adventure inspires my writing, both poetry and prose.
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Ngo Binh Anh Khoa is currently teaching English in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. In his free time, he enjoys daydreaming and writing dark verses for entertainment. His poems have appeared, or are forthcoming, in Scifaikuest, Weirdbook, Spectral Realms, and other venues.
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t.santitoro is our editor!
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William Shaw is a poet and blogger from Sheffield, England. He has been writing haiku for eight years, and science fiction for as long as he can remember. You can find him on Twitter @Will_S_7
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Thomas Tilton is a counselor by day, poet by night, and a lifelong science fiction fan. He lives with his family in Michigan.
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