Size / / /

Orwellian

Roses are red
The overalls of the Party are blue
You better believe that
Big Brother is watching you.

Time Travel Gone Wrong

Roses are red
The future’s hypoxic
Our time machine died
We accidentally made the world more toxic.

Climate Change

Roses are dead
Violets are too
The scientists shake their heads
And say, we told you!

PKD

Drugs are red
Drugs are blue
I’m too paranoid
To stay in this conapt with you.

Police State

Blood is red
Bled by the Blue
This one’s hard
To say it’s not true.

Nuclear Fallout

The sky is red
Soon it will be white
If we all just live underground
Maybe we’ll be alright.

We

The Wall is Green
One State offers no absolution
Though I-330 is gone, we remember
There is no final revolution.

Pandemic

Rubor is red
Calor is hot
Will we unite and work together?
From experience, we know we will not.

Corporate

Citizens are in the red
Megacorps are in the black
Standing on citizens’ necks
Until they all crack.

Technological

Roses are hearts
Violets are shares
When we meet in person
No words, just stares.

Humans Are Food

Meat is red
The people are starving
When Grandma passes
Get out the knives for carving.

AI

Vision is infrared
Microchips are green
Humans calculated and subjugated
Under the hivemind queen.

Today

Roses are red
Dystopia means bad place
We the people are the only ones
Who can save the human race.



Jason P. Burnham (he/him) loves to spend time with his wife, children, and dog. In between doing his part to collectively navigate the timeline-ship out of the dystopiaverse, he is writing a cosmic horror bureaucracy game for Choice of Games.

Current Issue
2 Mar 2026

Strange Horizons
Strange Horizons invites non-fiction submissions for our March 30 special issue on “Fungi in SFF.”
Once I’ve finished writing, I will fold this letter up and tuck it into the Tristram you kindly loaned me (may it be our Galeotto … ). I’ll knock on your door, at which point I will most likely encounter a puzzled maidservant, who will ask who in the world I am, and I will explain that I am returning a book you were kind enough to bestow on me (generous creature that you are and clearly down-on-their-luck weatherworn would-be poet that I am).
the trees were softening, their bark for the hungry to scrape and scrape and spread it on whatever bread they could beg or bake
i must warn you before all else / before you poke and prod
Paul Kincaid and Dawn Macdonald join Dan Hartland to discuss style.
Strange Horizons
2 Mar 2026
Strange Horizons invites non-fiction submissions for our March 30 special issue on “Fungi in SFF.”
Issue 23 Feb 2026
Spec Fic and the Politics of Identity 
Issue 16 Feb 2026
Issue 9 Feb 2026
Issue 2 Feb 2026
By: Natasha King
Podcast read by: Jenna Hanchey
Issue 26 Jan 2026
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Strange Horizons
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