032820

Reach Out and Touch Someone

two

hearts

beat-beat

entangled

I taste her coffee

we lick our lips and touch ourselves

later we realize we should have used protection

070719c

The Trajectory of Culture 

Before they encountered us
the Fomalhauts
possessed no concept of self-indulgence
worker bees, folk called them
the proverbial dull boy
never mind the head appendages
or the scales
or how they reproduce through the mail
(they had no spam).
 
Before we met them
they had no vigilante justice
they found our pornography
appealing, and soon invented
their own, which usually arrived postage due.
 
We introduced credit cards,
bank loans, compound interest;
they found these novel concepts.
 
We took them on tours
of our marketplaces
where every price, it appeared,
had been reduced.
Amazing the debt these aliens accrued.
 
It was direct-mail advertising
that really did them in--
at frst the spots were, well, naïve
but as the ads race intensifed
the Fomarketers learned that sex sells

Fomals sporting overlarge
sense-enhancing gear in black plastic
tore open packages claiming to contain
freeze-dried mail-order brides
(really just powdered food products).
 
Winsome young Fomies were
tearing open their mail too
receiving proposals of marriage
from princes
     wrongfully deposed
     handsome
     generous.
 
A few months later – captivated
by artifcial insemination
and our hi-tech DNA manipulation,
Fomies were popping larvae all over:
     Twins!
          Triplets!
               By the broodsac!
                    The boatload!
while the non-brooding fomals
postal donors of GM gametes
(not one of them a prince
or even a duke)
took no responsibility at all.
 
Most of these unnatural offspring
were grievously flawed--
injured by experimental methods
that would never have been allowed on humans--
although they were available in a variety of colors
and with naturally perfumed excreta
 
We converted them to our religions
(no matter which, so long
as they selected one or another).
We gave them nihilism, narcissism,
solipsism, existentialism
(not to mention pessimism).
We sold them anti-depressants,
antioxidants, anti-coagulants,
then we upped the anti.
 
The Fomalhauts have recently been
reclassifed as a vanished species,
unfortunately extinct. Their culture
and civilization, so many millennia old,
suddenly defunct. A sad coincidence,
so soon after encountering us.
They will be missed
 

--David C. Kopaska-Merkel & Kendall Evans

from our new Elgin-nominated collection, Entanglement 
Print copies $8 postpaid from me (more if sent outside the US) 

061819e

A new review of Entanglement, a book of collaborative SF poetry by me and Kendall Evans. Entanglement has been nominated for an Elgin this year.

http://www.songsoferetz.com/

061119d

these are the turns of our disk

coupled across light years

I move – you move

050919

Entanglement (with Kendall Evans), diminuendo press, poetry, 2018, ISBN 13: 978-1-936021-56-7 (print)

A 2018 collaborative SF poetry book, eligible in the full-length book category for the Elgin award.  SFPA members,  email me (jopnquog@gmail.com) for a pdf to consider whether to nominate the book.

Update

This book has been nominated for the Elgin award.

Buy a print copy here for $8.99 https://www.alteredrealitymag.com/poets/meet-david-c-kopaska-merkel/

Or signed by me for the same price (postpaid) via paypal to jopnquog@gmail.com

062118c

entangled spheres

cold as space

silent as … space

these are our turns

coupled across light years

I move – you move

040718b

Brand-new chapbook of collaborative SF poetry. $8.99 postpaid print copies from me. For now, this is the only way you can get it; we'll have an ebook soon. Order via paypal (jopnquog@gmail.com) or check made out to me (1300 Kicker, Tusc. AL 35404)

032318c

In the very near future, the long out-of-print chapbook, Nightship to Never, by me and Kendall Evans, will be available as an e-book. Available now, our brand-new chapbook, Entanglement,  both in print and as an ebook. This one will be eligible for the Elgin award next year. Both of these chapbooks feature collaborative science fiction and fantasy poetry. Finally, we have a collaborative poem in this year's Rhysling anthology, which I think you will really like.

Entanglement print $9; paypal jopnquog@gmail.com; check, 1300 Kicker Rd., Tuscaloosa AL 35404.

031018d

I have a new chapbook out, a collection of collaborative speculative poems, written with Kendall Evans. We have been collaborating for decades, and this is our 4th chapbook. Print copy price: $8.99 + $2 Shipping. Also, I have pdfs free to potential reviewers. Just let me know if you want one of those.