The candidates for the 2021 Rhysling Award, which are nominated by the membership of the SFPA, have been announced!
Voting begins on 1 April 2021 and closes 15 June 2021. Only current members may vote. To join, please go here.
| Short Poems (100 poems) |
| “Summer Time(lessness)” • Linda D. Addison • Star*Line 43.4 |
| “Timegeddon” • Francis Wesley 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 |
| “Mrs. Housekeeper” • Beth Cato • Eye To The Telescope 35 |
| “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 |
| “Isotropical” • 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) |
| “Disassembly at auction” • Robin Wyatt Dunn • Mobius: The Journal of Social Change 31:4 |
| “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” • Oliver 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,May |
| “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 (64 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 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 |
| “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 Nightmares114 |
| “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 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 • A Collection of Dreamscapes (Raw Dog Screaming Press) |
| “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 |
SPECPO 