Size / / /

I am taking back the moon

for the lunatics,

the lovers,

and the poets.

Real estate agents

may notice a gap in the night sky

and put away their signs.

The scientists can measure

the diameter of this darker

darkness,

triangulate its distance from Earth,

and conclude what's missing

must be the moon.

But I have it right here

under my arm,

wrapped in a notebook

leaking light,

and am coming toward you

with a poem it helped me write.

I pull it out and read by the moon's light:

         The Swimmer

     He dives into the moon

     from the pier on the lake,

     hits his target dead center;

     and, coming up for air,

     finds none.




Duane Ackerson's poetry has appeared in Rolling Stone, Yankee, Prairie Schooner, The Magazine of Speculative Poetry, Cloudbank, alba, Starline, Dreams & Nightmares, and several hundred other places. He has won two Rhysling awards and a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. He lives in Salem, Oregon. You can find more of his work in our archives.
Current Issue
16 Mar 2026

The garden is the resting place of your vulnerabilities; there’s a reason you’ve left them here instead of carrying them with you. Typically you enter hardened and hurried, beelining straight for the correct plot and quickly releasing whatever is clutched in your hand without a second thought—today, an attempted weaving of leather and lace, strength and suppleness that your body cannot figure out how to wear, nor your words to narrate.
If you say there are rats, I will believe you, though I don’t hear or see them.
A ruffling of branches as they resettle for the night. We dare not ask why they are here.
Spec Fic and the Politics of Identity 
As part of a collective of African writers who have created an Afrocentric Sauútiverse of five planets, two suns and a spirit moon, a world of science and fantasy, where there is no written language, we play with technology and sound magic to scrutinise the world as we know it, and use speculative fiction as a response to our world. 
Friday: When Among Crows and To Clutch a Razor by Veronica Roth 
Issue 9 Mar 2026
By: Lio Abendan
Podcast read by: Jenna Hanchey
Strange Horizons
2 Mar 2026
Strange Horizons invites non-fiction submissions for our March 30 special issue on “Fungi in SFF.”
Issue 2 Mar 2026
Strange Horizons
Issue 23 Feb 2026
Issue 16 Feb 2026
Issue 9 Feb 2026
Issue 2 Feb 2026
By: Natasha King
Podcast read by: Jenna Hanchey
Issue 26 Jan 2026
Issue 19 Jan 2026
Issue 12 Jan 2026
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