Mythic and delirious
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davidkmMythic Delirium 17 (Summer/Fall 2007) (info at [http://mythicdelirium.com/]) is the most-recent issue of this poetry-only print magazine.
MD 17 contains 21 poems by as many poets. Most of these poems are mythic and most of them are fantasy. There is such a thing as mythic science fiction, and there is some here. Or maybe it's mythic fantasy and science fiction stuck together like a Reese's peanut butter cup. Illustrations include a wraparound color cover by Tim Mullins and black-and-white interior illustrations, all evidently commissioned to accompany particular poems, by several artists. Graphically, the only false note is struck by the inside covers, which are covered with a grid of alternating white and gray skulls on gray and white background. It seems more silly than anything else.
One of my favorite poems in this issue is "Weightless," by K. S. Hardy. This short free-verse fantasy poem toys with the reader, seeming to lead in one direction, only to pivot in the last stanza and deliver a zinger. I don't want to give away the story so I won't quote any of the poem here. I can say that I have read many of Hardy's poems over the years and I think this is one of the very best.
I also like "Nine days out --" by Jaime Lee Moyer. This poem is science fiction, and free verse, but that's not a surprise. Almost every poem in Mythic Delirium is free verse, and the remainder are prose poems (1) or haiku (a couple). The poem describes capture of animals for extraterrestrial zoos or collectors. Here is a snippet.
Only nine days out and months to go,
time enough to worry he won't survive,
time enough to fashion excuses
for disappointed collectors,
more than time to speculate which
parts of you they'll cut off first
And then there is "Fitcher's Third Wife," by Leah Bobet. A free-verse fantasy poem, with a kick.
They tell stories about third daughters
because no one wants a fourth.
It doesn't take long, laugh the men in the kitchen
for a soul to get tired of daughters.
This is a hard and realistic look at a fantasy trope, just the sort of thing I have come to expect from Bobet. Girls will be girls, and men will be men, and in real life neither girls, nor men, nor medieval farm life, are anything like the way they have been represented in fairy tales.
In "Gleipnir Diaries," by JoSelle Vanderhooft, a Norse myth is retold in the only long poem in this issue of the magazine. A favorite way of writers to look again at the old myths, folktales, and what have you is to ask the question "who really were the bad guys and who the good guys anyway?" Vanderhooft does that here.
Of all my father's monstrous progeny
unlucky in face and limb alike
I was allowed to stay.
"You see," said Father Loki, cuffing me
and rolling up my stomach for their hands.
"He is no different from the hounds.
Look! And such a good dog, too!"
Yes, the myths tell us something about how this began and how it ended, but what went on in between? Inquiring minds can find out now. The Norse gods were mean and they deserved what they got. You could certainly make a case for that, anyway. You could only get into heaven at all by being a particularly successful warrior, which meant that all women, all who died young, and almost everybody else couldn't go there. That doesn't seem very nice, and that doesn't even consider how they treated their enemies. They were condemned to eternal torment! Okay, maybe that isn't particularly unusual for mythologies, but I am with Mr. Horse on this: "No sir, I don't like it." The myth: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenrisulfr]
Classical Greek mythology is retold (and revised) in "Daphne's Myth Revisited" by cythera.
bare trees stood
in terrible attitudes.
Near-deafening music
struck me; I felt it
stitch into my flesh
It probably wasn't fun to have the attention of the classical Greek gods; I think we all know that. But exactly how wasn't it fun? This poem shows one way. More about the myth: [http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daphne_%28mythology%29]
Poets represented in this issue, in addition to those already mentioned, include Darrell Schweitzer, Sonya Taaffe, Debbie Kolodji, and Ann K. Schwader, among others. I would love to tell you about a lot more of them, but you really should just buy the magazine. That way you don't have to subsist on mere excerpts. Besides, I am afraid I have already gone on too long.
MD 17 contains 21 poems by as many poets. Most of these poems are mythic and most of them are fantasy. There is such a thing as mythic science fiction, and there is some here. Or maybe it's mythic fantasy and science fiction stuck together like a Reese's peanut butter cup. Illustrations include a wraparound color cover by Tim Mullins and black-and-white interior illustrations, all evidently commissioned to accompany particular poems, by several artists. Graphically, the only false note is struck by the inside covers, which are covered with a grid of alternating white and gray skulls on gray and white background. It seems more silly than anything else.
One of my favorite poems in this issue is "Weightless," by K. S. Hardy. This short free-verse fantasy poem toys with the reader, seeming to lead in one direction, only to pivot in the last stanza and deliver a zinger. I don't want to give away the story so I won't quote any of the poem here. I can say that I have read many of Hardy's poems over the years and I think this is one of the very best.
I also like "Nine days out --" by Jaime Lee Moyer. This poem is science fiction, and free verse, but that's not a surprise. Almost every poem in Mythic Delirium is free verse, and the remainder are prose poems (1) or haiku (a couple). The poem describes capture of animals for extraterrestrial zoos or collectors. Here is a snippet.
Only nine days out and months to go,
time enough to worry he won't survive,
time enough to fashion excuses
for disappointed collectors,
more than time to speculate which
parts of you they'll cut off first
And then there is "Fitcher's Third Wife," by Leah Bobet. A free-verse fantasy poem, with a kick.
They tell stories about third daughters
because no one wants a fourth.
It doesn't take long, laugh the men in the kitchen
for a soul to get tired of daughters.
This is a hard and realistic look at a fantasy trope, just the sort of thing I have come to expect from Bobet. Girls will be girls, and men will be men, and in real life neither girls, nor men, nor medieval farm life, are anything like the way they have been represented in fairy tales.
In "Gleipnir Diaries," by JoSelle Vanderhooft, a Norse myth is retold in the only long poem in this issue of the magazine. A favorite way of writers to look again at the old myths, folktales, and what have you is to ask the question "who really were the bad guys and who the good guys anyway?" Vanderhooft does that here.
Of all my father's monstrous progeny
unlucky in face and limb alike
I was allowed to stay.
"You see," said Father Loki, cuffing me
and rolling up my stomach for their hands.
"He is no different from the hounds.
Look! And such a good dog, too!"
Yes, the myths tell us something about how this began and how it ended, but what went on in between? Inquiring minds can find out now. The Norse gods were mean and they deserved what they got. You could certainly make a case for that, anyway. You could only get into heaven at all by being a particularly successful warrior, which meant that all women, all who died young, and almost everybody else couldn't go there. That doesn't seem very nice, and that doesn't even consider how they treated their enemies. They were condemned to eternal torment! Okay, maybe that isn't particularly unusual for mythologies, but I am with Mr. Horse on this: "No sir, I don't like it." The myth: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenrisulfr]
Classical Greek mythology is retold (and revised) in "Daphne's Myth Revisited" by cythera.
bare trees stood
in terrible attitudes.
Near-deafening music
struck me; I felt it
stitch into my flesh
It probably wasn't fun to have the attention of the classical Greek gods; I think we all know that. But exactly how wasn't it fun? This poem shows one way. More about the myth: [http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daphne_%28mythology%29]
Poets represented in this issue, in addition to those already mentioned, include Darrell Schweitzer, Sonya Taaffe, Debbie Kolodji, and Ann K. Schwader, among others. I would love to tell you about a lot more of them, but you really should just buy the magazine. That way you don't have to subsist on mere excerpts. Besides, I am afraid I have already gone on too long.
