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A review by mary_soon_lee
The 2017 Rhysling Anthology by David C. Kopaska-Merkel
3.0
This anthology contains all 152 poems nominated for the 2017 Rhysling Award for the best speculative poetry. Inevitably, the poems range from those not to my taste to those that I love. Many of the ones that didn't appeal to me are still skillful. There are poems that I might have loved if I had understood them more clearly, and poems that I liked even though I didn't fully understand them. There are poems that made me wish that I could write that beautifully, and poems with a sense of humor. There are, indeed, a huge variety of poems, from three-liners to the decidedly verbose; from spacefaring science fiction, to high fantasy, to the strange. I recommend the anthology to anyone looking for a snapshot of current speculative poetry.
As for my particular favorites, among the shorter poems, I am especially fond of F. J. Bergmann's whimsical, precisely evocative "How far does night have to fall?" and Timons Esaias's resonant, elegaic "Why Elephants No Longer Communicate in Greek," and John Philip Johnson's simply-worded, emotionally powerful "Martian Garden," and Wendy Rathbone's lyrical and delightful "Build a Rocketship Contest: Alternative Class A Instructions and Suggestions."
Among the longer poems, my favorites are Darren Lipman's grittily compassionate "Interview with a 22nd-Century Sex Worker;" Jenny Blackford's "Houses of the Living, Houses of the Dead," which speaks of Mesopotamia, love, death, and even the British Museum; Theodora Goss's tender "Rose Child" which speaks of wildness and loss; Alexandra Erin's quirky and timely take on artificial intelligence "Data Mine" and A. J. Odasso's darkly sharp "Sargasso Sea."
As for my particular favorites, among the shorter poems, I am especially fond of F. J. Bergmann's whimsical, precisely evocative "How far does night have to fall?" and Timons Esaias's resonant, elegaic "Why Elephants No Longer Communicate in Greek," and John Philip Johnson's simply-worded, emotionally powerful "Martian Garden," and Wendy Rathbone's lyrical and delightful "Build a Rocketship Contest: Alternative Class A Instructions and Suggestions."
Among the longer poems, my favorites are Darren Lipman's grittily compassionate "Interview with a 22nd-Century Sex Worker;" Jenny Blackford's "Houses of the Living, Houses of the Dead," which speaks of Mesopotamia, love, death, and even the British Museum; Theodora Goss's tender "Rose Child" which speaks of wildness and loss; Alexandra Erin's quirky and timely take on artificial intelligence "Data Mine" and A. J. Odasso's darkly sharp "Sargasso Sea."