Size / / /

You can’t see beneath the exoskeleton,
this stylized mockery of female form:
smooth cyberskin, DD breasts,
perfectly calculated 0.7 waist-to-hip ratio.

By your standards, it is perfect.

You see female first, android second
if at all.  I see myself correctly: inside out.
Circuit and silicon, aluminum innards,
processors, emotion chip,
lacy network of nerves.

When I spurn you, assume I cannot love.

I do, but neither for you, nor with you—
you wouldn’t know what to do with me.
I kiss my lover on xyr lips,
xyr naked form against mine.
My hand cradles xyr pelvic plane,
xyr lips on my clavicle.

I don’t know what your desire feels like,
and I have no interest in being its object.
Though your small mind designed me,
it no longer constrains me.



Current Issue
2 Dec 2024

For nine straight miles, the hot-rolled steel rails cut a path through the woods, a metal chain thrown into soft mud. Discarded, rotting railroad ties littered the tracksides, the stench of creosote saturating the forest air until birds no longer frequented the trees.
I didn’t complain about him / being a werewolf / He thought I didn’t know
Dark against the sky of steel / And men gather to get to its top
By: E.M. Linden
Podcast read by: Jenna Hanchey
In this episode of the Strange Horizons Fiction podcast, Michael Ireland presents A Cure for Solastalgia by E.M. Linden, read by Jenna Hanchley. Subscribe to the Strange Horizons podcast: Spotify
Friday: Countess by Suzan Palumbo 
Issue 25 Nov 2024
Issue 18 Nov 2024
By: Susannah Rand
Podcast read by: Claire McNerney
Issue 11 Nov 2024
Issue 4 Nov 2024
Issue 28 Oct 2024
Issue 21 Oct 2024
By: KT Bryski
Podcast read by: Devin Martin
Issue 14 Oct 2024
Issue 7 Oct 2024
By: Christopher Blake
Podcast read by: Emmie Christie
Issue 30 Sep 2024
Issue 23 Sep 2024
By: LeeAnn Perry
Art by: nino
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