The 2018 Rhysling Winners

Mary Soon Lee photo2018 Rhysling Award—Short Poem: Mary Soon Lee
Winning poem: “Advice to a Six-Year-Old”

Appeared in Star*Line 40.2

Mary Soon Lee was born and raised in London, but now lives in Pittsburgh. She has had over three hundred poems published, in places ranging from American Scholar, to Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “Not Like This” is part of The Sign of the Dragon, her epic fantasy told in poems. The first part of King Xau’s story, Crowned: The Sign of the Dragon, Book 1, won the 2016 Elgin Award. A dozen poems from the epic may be read at thesignofthedragon.com.

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Neil Gaiman photo2018 Rhysling Award—Long Poem: Neil Gaiman
Winning poem: “The Mushroom Hiunters”

Appeared in Brainpickings 4/26/17

Neil Gaiman’s website.

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Sara Cleto photoSecond Place—Short Poem: Sara Cleto
“How to Grieve: A Primer for Witches”

Appeared in Mythic Delirium, May

Sara Cleto haunts the borders between folklore and literature in her poetry, fiction, and scholarship. She completed her PhD in English and Folklore at the Ohio State University in 2018, and she is a co-founder of The Carterhaugh School of Folklore and the Fantastic where she teaches courses on fairy tales, creative writing, mythic adaptation, and more. Her poetry and fiction can be found in Uncanny Magazine, Faerie Magazine, Liminality, Mythic Delirium, Goblin Fruit, and others. 

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Cassandra Rose Clarke photoSecond Place—Long Poem: Cassandra Rose Clarke
“For Preserves”

Appeared in Star*Line 40.4

Cassandra Rose Clarke’s work has placed in the Rhysling Awards and been nominated for the Philip K. Dick Award, the Romantic Times Reviewer's Choice Award, the Pushcart Prize, and YALSA's Best Fiction for Young Adults. ​She grew up in south Texas and currently lives in Houston, where she writes and serves as the associate director for Writespace, a literary arts nonprofit. She holds an M.A. in creative writing from The University of Texas at Austin, and in 2010 she attended the Clarion West Writer’s Workshop in Seattle. Her latest novel is Halo: Battle Born, forthcoming from Scholastic. 

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f j bergmann photoThird Place—Short Poem: F. J. Bergmann
“Gramarye”

Appeared in Polu Texni 12/26/17

F.J. Bergmann won the Rhysling Award for the Short Poem in 2008 and the Long Poem in 2015. She is pleased to mention that Star*Line published this year's winning short poem under her (former) editorship. She is the poetry editor of Mobius: The Journal of Social Change and the managing editor of MadHat Press. Her specialty is imagining tragedies on or near exoplanets.

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Mary Soon Lee photoThird Place—Long Poem: Mary Soon Lee
Poem: “Alternate Genders”

Appeared in Mithila Review 9

Mary Soon Lee was born and raised in London, but now lives in Pittsburgh. She has had over three hundred poems published, in places ranging from American Scholar, to Heroic Fantasy Quarterly, to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “Not Like This” is part of The Sign of the Dragon, her epic fantasy told in poems. The first part of King Xau’s story, Crowned: The Sign of the Dragon, Book 1, won the 2016 Elgin Award. A dozen poems from the epic may be read at thesignofthedragon.com.

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