My poem “Instructions for Astronauts” has been nominated for a Rhysling Award by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Poetry Association (SFPA)!
The poem was originally published in the Mithila Review along with a video produced by Salik Shah that includes my voice reading the poem. The Rhysling nomination means the poem will be published again, this time in The 2018 Rhysling Anthology of all nominated poems.
The National Book Critics Circle has announced today winners of three prestigious prizes and nominees in nonfiction, biography, autobiography, poetry, criticism and fiction. The awards will be announced on March 15.
I had two poems published in 2017 that are eligible for the 2018 Rhysling Awards, which are awards for speculative poetry. These awards must be nominated by a member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Poetry Association (I’m a member, but people can’t nominated their own poems).
Eligible in long-poem category:
Eligible in short-poem category:
Thanks for checking them out!
Thank you goes out to all the readers out there who’ve read my stuff, and to the editors and publisher who put my poetry and fiction out there for the world to read. (more…)
I always feel like I’ve never read enough.
These are the covers of the 30 books I completed reading in 2017, though some I may have started the year before. Some of the books are important. Some of them are fun. Some are both. (more…)
Thank you L’Éphémère Review for publishing my poem!
Read the rest of the poem here: http://www.ephemerereview.com/michael-janairo
Thank you, re:asian magazine, for including me in the “firsts” issue!
The poem touches upon things I’ve been thinking about since grade school when I first read the phrase “benevolent assimilation” as a U.S. description of its colonial policy with the Philippines.
The magazine has also published a photo I took of the home my Lolo — grandfather — grew up in Cavite.
Here’s an excerpt from the poem:
Something like fear structured my feelings around the word
Philippines and whatever it was that connected me to it
Check out the full poem on the re:asian website here and let me know what you think — either here or on the re:asian site.
Thank you to Charles Payseur at Quick Sip Reviews for taking the time to read my work and write about it. Very cool!
Quick snippet “strange and haunting” and “great”!
If you need more, here are some snippets from his review of “Instructions for Astronauts”:
This is a rather strange and haunting poem about humanity fleeing Earth in an attempt to survive, in an attempt to get to a different and better world, one unspoiled by our touch.
There is a strong religious element to the poem, all of the parts preceded by a biblical verse (save two) to set up how those sections read. These are the sections of the believers, of the grand hope for humanity. The renewal, the what-have-you. And I love that the poem sets itself up that way, with everything working and working toward this end, only to pull away at the ending …
He also calls the video “An amazing experience!”
Wow! Read what he wrote here.
Here’s the video
