Featured Poem • August 2015
The Villain’s Coat
Hannah Strom-Martin
I.
You can’t just buy it at the store. It’s earned like stripes or infamy. You must steal it off the back of a café chair. In the city where your escape pod crashed. Disappearing in the crowd While the white-hats pursue you, guns upraised.
II.
You must take it from your lover, in the rain. In the alley where you planned the rendezvous. Holding her at gunpoint while she lies. The secret plans are in the lining.
III.
You must make it yourself, in the midnight hour. From the teeth and hair of your enemies. Sew them together in the dark. Become a more fantastic beast.
Hannah Strom-Martin was born on a leap year and grew up on a one-lane, dead-end road. Possibly, this explains everything about her—including her reclusivity and tendency to adopt cats. Her writing has been published in Realms of Fantasy, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, On Spec, Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine, Strange Horizons, Underwords, the North Bay Bohemian, Northbay Biz, and the Sacramento News & Review, as well as in the anthologies Amazons: Sexy Tales of Strong Women, and Blood Sisters: Vampire Stories by Women. With Erin Underwood she is the editor of the anthologies The Pop Fic Review, and Futuredaze: An Anthology of Young Adult Science Fiction. She is usually working on a novel or dinner, and graduated with various degrees from Bennington College, the University of Southern Maine, and the Odyssey Summer Fantasy Writing Workshop.
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