Editor’s Note: Speculative Poetry 2021

B. Sharise Moore is taking over the role of Poetry Editor here at FIYAH for the year 2021. She’s outlined what she’s looking for below:

I wrote poetry before I ever took a stab at writing fiction. There was something organic and inviting about the rhythm, the voice, the freedoms of lines and stanzas that hypnotized me even as a young child. I began writing poetry when I was 10. None of it was very good, but I kept reading. (The best writers read A LOT).  And as an adult, I enrolled in undergraduate and graduate workshops that centered poetry. (Seek out writers groups. Trust me, they are invaluable and important to your growth as a writer.)

What am I looking for? I appreciate out of this world, inconceivable, fresh, and inspiring subject matter. Shock me. Stun me. Take an old trope and turn it on its head. Call out. Question. I’m looking for poems that I’d never expect to read, poems that are brave, poems that cry and laugh and teach. 

Inspire me to write. Make me research your subjects and characters. (I enjoy poems that teach me something new.) Don’t be afraid to write in form! There are so many, from sestina to lune to eintou to cinquain, yet I rarely see any submitted. This is the freedom of writing in verse. The white space is very much a part of your poem. Manipulate it. Use it. Ensnare me in a trap of wonder and imagery. And by all means, make sure your work is speculative. Speculative poems have myth, magic, folklore, horror, fantasy, and science, at their core. Please check out the following link to the poetry of the incomparable Bram Stoker Award Winner, Linda D. Addison. You can read more of her work here. I can’t wait to read what you’ve created.

B.