Congratulations to the very talented trio of Jessica Wick, Amal El-Mohtar, and Oliver Hunter for another splendid issue of Goblin Fruit, the tasty and handsomely illustrated online poetry journal. This spring issue marks the one year anniversary of their fertile collaboration -- made more challenging by the fact that the three live spread out across the globe.
Of the current issue Amal writes: "We wanted this issue to have a tang of salt air and loam to it, a feel of both drowning and digging; expect to find anything from dismembered elves to devoured dryads. There are maenads and mermaids and fairy princes; there are weddings, gods, frogs and ships (in no particular order), all dancing together in a way that I think would do Lewis Caroll proud."
This is another terrific collection of poems (those highlighted with a red leaf have an audio option). Among them, Karen A. Romanko, Casey Fiesler, and Karen Berry give us mermaids as drowned daughters, an awkward mermaid on a metro, and a poignant retelling of Ariel's fate from "The Little Mermaid." J. C. Runolfson writes a chilling poem of Green Jenny, a ghostly water sprite, while Kirsten Anderson celebrates the fantastic marriage between the land and the water. Catherynne Valente and JoSelle Vanderhooft plow new furrows in old myths and fairy tales.
As a bonus offering, the issue also presents the winners of the Faerie Queene Poetry contest which treated the subject of the Faerie Queene and Queen Elizabeth. It was my pleasure to be called in as the tie breaker at the last moment. First place went to Samantha Henderson for her wonderful ballad-like poem "Queen Elizabeth and the Fox," second place to Felicity Maxwell for "Corona Reginarum," and third place to Marcie Tentchoff for "Fair Price."
And as always, Oliver Hunter has illustrated the issue throughout with his sketches and paintings featured here in this post. You can see more of his remarkable work on Endicott in "The Mage of Muse Hill" and "Traveling the Wilds."
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