The 2021 Rhysling Awards
| Short Poem Category
First Place Second Place Third Place |
 |
Long Poem Category
First Place Second Place Third Place |
115 members voted
Winner Biographies and Photos
The 2021 Rhysling Anthology:
The Best Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Poetry of 2020
 |
|
Editor and Rhysling Chair: $16.95 + $4 U.S. shipping;
e-mail the treasurer for postage costs on multiple copies and/or international shipping. $4 .pdf. Payable by PayPal to
SFPATreasurer@gmail.com |
2021 Rhysling Chair
Alessandro Manzetti (Rome, Italy) is a SFPA Elgin Award and two-time Bram Stoker Award-winning author and editor of horror fiction and dark poetry whose work has been published extensively in Italian and English, including novels, short and long fiction, poetry, essays, graphic novels and collections. English publications include his novels Shanti—The Sadist Heaven (2019) and Naraka—The Ultimate Human Breeding (2018), the novella The Keeper of Chernobyl (2019), the collections The Radioactive Bride (2020), The Garden of Delight (2017) and The Massacre of the Mermaids (2015), the poetry collections Whitechapel Rhapsody (2020), The Place of Broken Things (2019, with Linda D. Addison), War (2018, with Marge Simon), No Mercy (2017), Sacrificial Nights (2016, with Bruce Boston) Eden Underground (2015), Venus Intervention (2014, with Corrine de Winter), and the graphic novels Calcutta Horror (2019) and Her Life Matters (2020). He edited the anthologies The Beauty of Death (2016), The Beauty of Death Vol. 2—Death by Water (2017, with Jodi Renee Lester) and Monsters of Any Kind (2018, with Daniele Bonfanti). He has been nominated multiple times for the Bram Stoker Award, the Splatterpunk Award, the This Is Horror Award, the SFPA Rhysling and Elgin Awards and the Indie Horror Book Award, and he received the HWA Specialty Press Award for his press Independent Legions. His stories and poems have appeared in Italian, U.S., UK and Polish magazines, such as Dark Moon Digest, Splatterpunk Zine, Disturbed Digest, Space & Time, Weird Tales, The Horror Zine, Illumen, Devolution Z, Hinnom, Recompose, Polu Texni, Nothing's Sacred, Okolica Strachu, and anthologies such as Splatterpunk Forever, Best Hardcore Horror of the Year Vol. 2, 4 and 5, The Big Book of Blasphemy, Midnight Under the Big Top, Bones III, Rhysling Anthology (2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020), HWA Poetry Showcase Vols. 3 and 4, The Beauty of Death Vol. 1 and Vol. 2, Mar Dulce, I Sogni del Diavolo, Danze Eretiche Vol. 2, Il Buio Dentro, Sorrow, Pandemonium. He is the CEO & Founder of Independent Legions Publishing, editor in chief of Molotov Magazine and Illégale Magazine (in Italian), HWA Active member and a former HWA Board of Trustees member. Website: battiago.com
106 members nominated.
| Short Poems (98 poems) |
| “Summer Time(lessness)” • Linda D. Addison • Star*Line 43.4 |
| “Timegeddon” • Francis W. 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 |
| “The Luck Eaters” • Beth Cato & Rhonda Parrish • Star*Line 43.3 |
| “Post-Obit Cautionary Tale” • G. O. Clark • Tales From the Moonlit 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 |
| “Isotopical” • 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) |
| “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” • Bran 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 • Awen 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 137 |
| “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” • Alan 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 the 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 43 |
| “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 |
| “Mrs. Housekeeper” • Beth Cato • Eye To The Telescope 35 |
| “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” • S. Qiouyi Lu • Charge Magazine 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 H. Payne • Silver Blade 47 |
| “Caged” • Marsheila Rockwell • American Diversity Report, December 16 |
| “Our Lady of the Acherontia” • Allan Rozinski • Spectral Realms 13 |
| “Such Monstrous Births” • Emily Smith • Strange Horizons, 9 March |
| “All That I Have Lost” • Christina Sng • Spectral Realms 13 |
| “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 Witch Scorned” • 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 |
| Nominations per publication (82 publications): | ||
| 1 | 34 Orchard | |
| 5 | Abyss & Apex | |
| 1 | Air: Sylphs, Spirits & Swan Maidens, ed. Rhonda Parrish (Tyche Books) | |
| 1 | Altered Reality Magazine | |
| 1 | American Diversity Report | |
| 1 | Analog Science Fiction and Fact | |
| 1 | Android Girl and Other Sentient Speculations (Three Ravens Publishing) | |
| 1 | Awen | |
| 3 | Apparition Lit | |
| 1 | Arcana | |
| 1 | Arrival Mind (Outland Publishing) | |
| 1 | Arsenika | |
| 4 | |
Asimov’s Science Fiction |
| 2 | Augur Magazine | |
| 1 | Baffling Magazine | |
| 2 | Bewildering Stories | |
| 2 | Black Flames & Gleaming Shadows (Bold Venture Press) | |
| 1 | Charge Magazine | |
| 2 | A Collection of Dreamscapes (Raw Dog Screaming Press) | |
| 1 | Community of Magic Pens (Atthis Arts anthology) | |
| 1 | Corvid Queen | |
| 1 | Crow & Cross Keys | |
| 1 | Cosmic Horror Monthly | |
| 1 | Déraciné | |
| 4 | Dreams and Nightmares | |
| 1 | Drunk Monkeys | |
| 1 | Eternal Haunted Summer | |
| 10 | Eye to the Telescope | |
| 1 | Fantasy Magazine | |
| 2 | Final Cut Zine | |
| 1 | FIYAH | |
| 1 | Freeze Ray Poetry | |
| 1 | The Future Fire | |
| 1 | Glitchwords | |
| 2 | Heroic Fantasy Quarterly | |
| 2 | HWA Poetry Showcase Vol. VII, ed. Stephanie Wytovich | |
| 3 | Illumen | |
| 1 | Impspired | |
| 1 | Kaleidotrope | |
| 9 | Liminality | |
| 1 | Line of Advance (2020 Col. Darron L. Wright Memorial Awards) | |
| 1 | Liquid Imagination | |
| 1 | The Literary Hatchet | |
| 1 | Little Death Lit | |
| 1 | Making the Novel | |
| 1 | Michigan Quarterly | |
| 2 | Midnight Under the Big Top, ed. Brian James Freeman (Cemetery Dance Publications) | |
| 1 | Mithila Review | |
| 1 | Mobius: The Journal of Social Change | |
| 2 | Monstrous (IP: Brisbane, Australia) | |
| 1 | Moonchild Magazine | |
| 2 | New Myths | |
| 1 | Nightingale & Sparrow | |
| 1 | Octavos | |
| 1 | Penumbra | |
| 1 | Poetry Super Highway | |
| 5 | Polu Texni | |
| 1 | Rattle | |
| 1 | Rejection Letters | |
| 1 | Ribbons | |
| 1 | Scifaikuest | |
| 1 | SFPA Halloween Page | |
| 1 | SFPA Poetry Contest | |
| 1 | Shelved: Appalachian Resilience Amid Covid-19 (Mountain Gap Books anthology) | |
| 3 | The Sign of the Dragon (JABberwocky Literary Agency) | |
| 4 | Silver Blade | |
| 1 | Simultaneous Times | |
| 1 | Songs of Eretz Poetry Review | |
| 4 | Space & Time Magazine | |
| 3 | Spectral Realms | |
| 1 | Speculations II: Poetry from the Weird Poets’ Society, ed. Frank Coffman | |
| 6 | Speculative North | |
| 15 | Star*Line | |
| 5 | Strange Horizons | |
| 1 | Survision Magazine | |
| 1 | Taj Mahal Review | |
| 1 | Tales from the Moonlit Path | |
| 1 | Twelve (Interstellar Flight Press) | |
| 6 | Uncanny | |
| 1 | Utopia Science Fiction | |
| 1 | Whitechapel Rhapsody (Independent Legions) | |
| 1 | The Withering (Jackanapes Press) | |
