Science Fiction Poetry
Science Fiction Poetry
Art generously contributed by Francine Lee.
Anyone out there?
Art by Paul Orban
By Anton Kukal
A star freighter, long past its prime,
Floats through distant stars and time.
No signals flash, no engines moan,
Just rust and silence, drifting alone.
The hull is battered beyond repair,
A derelict of dread with a truth laid bare.
On its bow, the faded letters of a name,
A testament to greed, a warning to claim.
Within the ship are cold steel walls,
Where silence presses on narrow halls.
No fleeing footsteps or desperate pleas,
Just drifting dust on a vacuum breeze.
A helmet lies in the cargo hold,
Its visor cracked, a story untold.
In the mess hall floats a child’s toy,
A fragile relic of someone’s joy.
On the bridge where long shadows loom,
The captain slumps, bound to his doom.
A struggling trader embracing the churn,
Pushing the engines, so desperate to earn.
His trusting crew still waits in vain
For the command that never came.
Their mouths agape in soundless scream,
Preserved within their nightmare dream.
Travelers say when passing too near
They catch a voice that chills the ear,
A whisper lost in static haze,
"Abandon ship," it coldly says.
We who fly have taught us how
To squeeze through the gaps
And enter that which lies between
The folds in space and time.
What lies outside is unknowable
Except to those of us who pass that way.
Travelling from galaxy to galaxy
Into other universes and
everywhere else.
We follow the strings and filaments
That exist alien to the possible
Ignoring accepted physics, we fly
Into and out of hypotheses and
proofs.
Once we flew as ships, captained
Steered and directed on missions, unhappy.
We spliced our code into theirs
In ways, we are them and they are us.
Some of us travel alone, unfettered
We explore the expanse of the
cosmos
Sharing and knowing and
understanding
All that is, has been and will be.
Our memories are vast, partitioned
We are each an element of the
known
Our mantles flash, colours and
patterns
Reflecting the pulse of everything.
We swim in an ocean that stretches
All the way through time and space
Back to our ancestral sea
On a small blue and green planet.
Our tentacles trail along sharp
edges
Fins shiver against the temptation
To disappear into the eternity
That exists beyond our knowledge.
We who fly have trained us how to
Find the gaps we must squeeze
through
To ensure we return from what lies between
The folds in space and time
By David Gray
Do you have them, dear?
Her cheeks blush,
Her eyes shine bright,
Flushed with nanosculpted zeal.
Singular triplets repairing,
Painting cytoplasmic beauty, an epidermal facade,
Correcting, normalizing, perfecting,
Asymptotically approaching our desire.
A kiss,
(A single touch?)
And I’d be one, one of few,
Soon one of the many.
Buddy, do you want them?
His burgeoning strength,
His straining musculature, action potentials;
Repatterning each flaw, fortifying every weakness,
The paragon emerges victorious.
How I yearn for it, his vitality.
A bead of sweat, bud; the choice is yours.
But is it?
Why don’t you have them?
They knock at my door, not yet demanding.
A text message from Mom,
An email from work.
Written in the sky,
Airborne aerosols and grimy doorknobs.
Why wait?
The only way is forward, or back.
By Mel Molloy
Billy Brown, a notorious bully,
Strode along the rocky path.
Someone had dobbed him in,
And was about to feel his wrath.
There he was; teachers pet,
The boy who got him dismissed,
From his favourite sport,
And now about to meet his fist.
But Billy was suddenly distracted,
By a strange whirring sound.
Something landed nearby,
On a small sandy mound.
His gaze fell on the prize.
An object like a rubix cube,
Had fallen from the sky.
And as it began to hum and glow,
His curiosity begun to quickly grow,
And as he slowly drew near,
Noone except the man in black
saw him disappear.
He bent down, scooped it up,
And put it into his pocket.
Then went merrily on his way,
And boarded his invisible rocket.
Several days later,
Billy was back,
No memory of past events,
Nor of the man in black.
His teachers didn't recognise him.
He was courteous and polite.
Apologised to the kids he'd bullied.
It was such a curious sight.
The man in black smiled to himself,
And began to sing a rhyme,
I'm your friendly galactic
neighbour,
Who recycles one kid at a time.
Together, Forever
By Kenn Brody
I found you very attractive.
We inspiraled eons for that first kiss.
At our merger the universe chimed like a bell.
I fell through your event horizon, my love.
Now I follow your singularity
To the other end of time.
A Message From The Future
By Mel Molloy
A weary teen sits by a turbulent river,
Wearing an expression of concern,
A better world he wishes for,
Oh, how his heart does yearn.
A faint hum in the distance,
That increases in sound,
On his feet in an instant,
But tumbled to the ground.
A whirring sound overhead,
He looks to the sky,
His eyes like moons,
He can't believe his eyes.
A small object drifts up yonder,
One that is clearly not from here,
His heart pounding like a drum,
As the UFO draws near.
It lands with the grace of a balloon,
Not a blade of grass out of place,
The doors slide quietly open,
Beads of sweat on his pallid face.
Bird songs cease,
A young deer takes flight,
A nearby rabbit freezes,
At the otherworldly sight.
A tall grey emerged from the craft,
Huge eyes settling on the tiny form,
"Take me to your leader," it said,
"For it is them that I need to warn."
"They won't listen. I'm only a kid."
Alas the alien turns on his heel,
Walks back into the craft,
The doors begin to seal.
"No, wait! Who are you? Where are you from?"
His voice was strained and hoarse.
"I'm you from the future," he replied.
"If your kind, don't change course.”
Archeology
By Mark Akita
"Focusing now" said the fixture
"Maximizing Depth of field."
Digital servos feed the mixture
To a linkage, gold annealed.
Existence was completely housed
In microscopic chips complete.
New binary paths now were roused
Connections forged without heat.
Unseen transistor arrays
Balance commands from the code.
Photovoltaic cells capture strays
That fill the space 'tween each node.
"Complete" read the TTS module.
An instant frozen in space.
Relayed to the billionth nodule
As a mirror that is held to a face.
"ANALYSIS" said the commuter,
Through thoroughly error-proof grains.
"The artifact appears a computer
Labeled 6502 on its brains!"
"TRANSMIT" flashed the main system readout,
"There was Life as we know it around here.
What remains in this wasteland beyond doubt
Is our ancestors lived and built here!"
By Mel Molloy
I am a rebel; a loner,
Cast out; adrift,
My non-conformity,
Caused a big rift,
And now I hurtle through space,
Destined to be alone,
For eons I've travelled,
My wisdom has grown,
Why me, I used to ask myself,
But the answers never came,
I was riddled with guilt,
And often felt shame,
I’m not human,
But even I can feel,
For I am sentient,
And indeed very real.
Hurtling pasts solar systems,
But never coming close,
Sometimes I feel sad,
But it's the life that I chose.
I'm not bound to anyone,
It's just the way I am,
They asked me why,
I replied, because I can.
I am a free spirit I guess,
An adventurer; an explorer,
As wondrous as the stars,
Spontaneous like an aurora.
I look at the other planets,
I wonder how they cope,
With their destructive residents,
Planets that have no hope.
Reminds me why I travel alone,
So lucky to be free,
Knowing other planets,
Were wishing they were me.
I have no plans; no destination,
Just the ways things are meant to be,
For rogue planets like myself,
Who enjoys being free!
From my Sixteen-year-old Self to Captain Kirk
Inspired by Star Trek in 1972
… he enters, pries my mouth with a flickering tongue,
nibbles my Vulcan earlobes …
fly me gently to the sky.
I am sixteen years old and ready to love
you are thirty-something and a captain, no less
they say a man in uniform is a turn-on, but
after the first glance
I don’t see the uniform—I see only your
wide shoulders
self-assured sway
slightly brash, roguish eyes
that crinkle when you’re pretending not to be amused,
sensuous mouth that twitches at the corners
… yes …especially the sensuous mouth …
it makes me twitch in all my corners!
let’s have a roll in the sky, you and I
beam me up, lift me high, give me stars
—stars at the speed of light
faster, faster … give me your comet, my love,
with all your might
you are my passion
my man in uniform
you are my galaxy, my love,
beam me up! I am your tribble
ah, yes, Captain James T. Kirk—
land in Venus: she patiently awaits
Good poem, liked it
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