io9: poetry

Neil Gaiman’s Illustrated Multi-Pronged Apocalypse

Lauren Davis — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 09:00:00 PST

In author Neil Gaiman’s poem “The Day the Saucers Came,” the various science fiction apocalypses all happen on the same day. Now artist Jouni Koponen has created a whimsical illustrated print of the poem.Koponen has collaborated with Gaiman in the past, providing illustrations for Shoggoth’s Old Peculiar, “Babycakes,” and “A Study in Emerald.” Being a fan of “The Day the Saucers Came,” Koponen worked with the Sandman and Coraline author to create a series of illustrations based on the poem, ultimately creating the poster below: The 10” x 28” poster is available for $45.00 from NeverWear. [Jouni Koponen via Neil Gaiman]

The Good Shit From Beowulf, In the Form of an Alliterative Poem

Annalee Newitz — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 08:20:13 PST

Beowulf, the CGI 3D monstrosity that hits theaters Friday, was originally an alliterative Old English poem. Instead of composing a review of this cinematic epic, I'll just go Old English on your ass and alliterate. Below the fold are your spoilers, in verse.

Sea monsters mangled from inside their eggy eyeballs by sword-swinging soldiers are absolutely awesome.

Angelina Jolie is nasty and naked, but her nether regions are non-existent.

Let us contemplate the conical comeliness of D-cups in 3D.

Grendel grabs a guy, bites his skull, then burps brain. Bitchen!

Beowulf bounces across a wooden beam, buck naked, to grab Grendel's gooey globs. Borat at the insurance broker's ball?

This flick is full of pointy things pricking at crotches, cracks, and cups.

Dude! A dragon-man! Dude!

3D kinda sucks. And it can't alliterate with anything either.

The Only Good Science Fiction Poems Ever Written Are By Jessy Randall

Annalee Newitz — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 08:00:02 PST

She's not exactly your typical science fiction writer, but Colorado poet Jessy Randall has done what precious few poets have ever done well: beautifully capture the way our emotional lives in the modern world have become infused with the imagery and alienness of science fiction. I just heard Randall give a reading in support of her new collection, A Day in Boyland (Ghost Road Press), and she had the audience eating out of her hand and laughing at poems about looking for boyfriends on other planets and imagining a future where women would have removable, sentient "bionic alabaster breasts."

I doubt Randall, who has been published in McSweenys, would characterize herself as an SF poet. Instead, she's preoccupied with space and science because it's part of the cultural imaginary around her and therefore she inevitably reflects that her verse. One of my favorite poems in A Day in Boyland is called "The Boring Conference Dinner," and it's a great example of how SF comes up in the middle of poems that aren't themselves focused on SF-ish subjects.

The poem is about — you guessed it — boring dinners at business conferences full of overly-jovial white guys. In the second section she writes:

Dinner consists of something in a puff pastry. But first there is a soup,
which is always a
GOD-DAMN TOMATO BISQUE

thick, salty,
like the spore of an alien.

A boring alien.

Sometimes sarcastic, sometime full of awe and sadness, Randall's poems are smart, lovely observations for people whose emotional landscapes are populated by imaginary beings no less poignant than real ones.

Jessy Randall's homepage