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This podcast is part of our 2015 fund drive bonus issue! Read more about Strange Horizons' funding model, or donate, here.

Direct link: Fund Drive poetry (MP3)

In this episode of the Strange Horizons podcast, editor Anaea Lay presents poetry from the issues.

  • “The Truth of Briars" by Jane Yolen, read by Ciro Faienza. You can read the full text of the poem and more about Jane here.
  • “B’resheet" by Julia Liberman, read by Julia Liberman. You can read the full text of the poem and more about Julia here.
  • “The Changeling's Gambit" by Sasha Kim, read by AJ Odasso. You can read the full text of the poem and more about Sasha here.
  • “Saturn Devouring His Young" by Carlos Hernandez, read by Carlos Hernandez . You can read the full text of the poem and more about Carlos here.
  • “Three Principles of Strong Building" by Rose Lemberg, read by Rose Lemberg. You can read the full text of the poem and more about Rose here.
  • “Nettle-stung" by Shweta Narayan, read by Shweta Narayan. You can read the full text of the poem and more about Shweta here.



AJ's first full-length poetry collection, The Sting of It, was published by Tolsun Books in 2019 and won Best LGBT Book in the New Mexico/Arizona Book Awards.  Their first novel, The Pursued and the Pursuing, was published by DartFrog Blue in 2021 and won 2nd place in the Adult Historical Fiction category of the Reads Rainbow Awards.  AJ holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Boston University and is a full-time English Faculty member at San Juan College.  AJ has been on staff at Strange Horizons since 2012.  You can find them on Twitter and visit their website.
When he's not writing SFF, Carlos Hernandez works as an Associate Professor of English at the City University of New York, with appointments at BMCC and the Graduate Center. He's also a game designer and lead writer on Meriwether, a Lewis and Clark CRPG. His first collection of short stories, The Assimilated Cuban's Guide to Quantum Santería, will be published by Rosarium in January 2016.
Ciro Faienza (pronounced CHEE-roh) is an American/Italian national. He has acted on stages and screens throughout Texas and Massachusetts, and his work as a filmmaker has shown at the Dallas Museum of Art, the Dallas Hub Theater, and the National Gallery, London. His fiction is featured in numerous publications, including Daily Science Fiction and Futuristica, Vol 1. His short story "J'ae's Solution" was a top finalist in PRI's 3-Minute Futures Contest. You can see his visual artwork at his web gallery, Postmedium.
Jane Yolen writes poetry for both children and adults. She is a past winner of the Science Fiction Poetry Association’s Rhysling award for a short poem, Dwarf Star Award for poems under ten lines, as well as being named by the Association as a Grand Master of science fiction and fantasy poetry. She is a frequent poetry contributor to such genre magazines as Asimov’s, Mythic Delirium, and Goblin Fruit. She has over 370 books published, a huge number of them poetry. Her books have won the Caldecott, the Christopher Medal, the Jewish Book Award, and two of her stories were Nebula winners. Three of her books won the Mythopoeic Award. Last year, she was named a winner of the New England Public Radio’s Arts and Humanities Award. And her Skylark Award set her good coat on fire.
Julia Burns Liberman is an artist who lives in Malden, MA with three hockey players and a large collection of rocks. Her art can be viewed at pelagielladesigns.tumblr.com. This is her first published poem.
R.B. Lemberg (they/them) is a queer, bigender immigrant from Ukraine to the US. R.B. is an author of six books of speculative fiction and poetry, an academic, and a translator from Ukrainian and Russian. R.B.’s work has been shortlisted for the Le Guin Prize for Fiction, Nebula, Locus, Ignyte, World Fantasy, and other awards. You can find R.B. on Instagram at @rblemberg, Bluesky at @rblemberg.bsky.social, and at their website rblemberg.net.
Sasha Kim is currently a junior at Ringling College, studying illustration. When not wrestling with art, she drinks too much tea, reads, and can sometimes be coaxed into writing as well. This is her first published poem.
Shweta Narayan was born in India and has lived in Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, the Netherlands, Scotland, and California. They feel kinship with shapeshifters and other liminal beings. Their short fiction and poetry has appeared in Strange Horizons, Mithila Review, Breaking the Bow: Speculative Fiction Inspired by the Ramayana, We See a Different Frontier: A Postcolonial Speculative Fiction Anthology, An Alphabet of Embers: An Anthology of Unclassifiables, Lightspeed: Queers Destroy Fantasy, and Clockwork Phoenix 3, among others. Shweta was the Octavia Butler Memorial Scholarship recipient at Clarion 2007 and was shortlisted for the 2010 Nebula Awards.
Current Issue
31 Mar 2025

We are delighted to present to you our second special issue of the year. This one is devoted to ageing and SFF, a theme that is ever-present (including in its absence) in the genre.
Gladys was approaching her first heat when she shed her fur and lost her tail. The transformation was unintentional, and unwanted. When she awoke in her new form, smelling of skin and sweat, she wailed for her pack in a voice that scraped her throat raw.
does the comb understand the vocabulary of hair. Or the not-so-close-pixels of desires even unjoined shape up to become a boat
The birds have flown long ago. But the body, the body is like this: it has swallowed the smaller moon and now it wants to keep it.
now, be-barked / I am finally enough
how you gazed on our red land beside me / then how you traveled it, your eyes gone silver
Here, I examine the roles of the crones of the Expanse space in Persepolis Rising, Tiamat’s Wrath, and Leviathan Falls as leaders and combatants in a fight for freedom that is always to some extent mediated by their reduced physical and mental capacity as older people. I consider how the Expanse foregrounds the value of their long lives and experience as they configure the resistance for their own and future generations’ freedom, as well as their mentorship of younger generations whose inexperience often puts the whole mission in danger.
In the second audio episode of Writing While Disabled, hosts Kristy Anne Cox and Kate Johnston welcome Farah Mendlesohn, acclaimed SFF scholar and conrunner, to talk all things hearing, dyslexia, and more ADHD adjustments, as well as what fandom could and should be doing better for accessibility at conventions, for both volunteers and attendees.
Issue 24 Mar 2025
Issue 17 Mar 2025
Issue 10 Mar 2025
By: Holli Mintzer
Podcast read by: Emmie Christie
Issue 3 Mar 2025
Issue 24 Feb 2025
Issue 17 Feb 2025
Issue 10 Feb 2025
By: Alexandra Munck
Podcast read by: Claire McNerney
Issue 27 Jan 2025
By: River
Issue 20 Jan 2025
Strange Horizons
By: Michelle Kulwicki
Podcast read by: Emmie Christie
Issue 13 Jan 2025
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