2025 Hugos: Goodreads / Librarything stats | Novel | Novella | Novelette | Short Story | Graphic Story or Comic | Related Work | Dramatic Presentation, Long and Short | Fancast | Poem | Lodestar | Astounding
So, the last literary category in this year’s Hugos that I’m going to write up is the special category award for Best Poem, a one-off for 2025. I found it pretty easy to rank them.
1) Calypso, by Oliver K. Langmead. Second paragraph of third chapter:
I spend a while exploring the tall halls,
Searching the archways for an ideal place.
It should be comfortable and intimate;
I always prefer to be warm at church.
This is a tremendous piece of work, 224 pages in length, a narrative about a generation starship and competing visions of the future, making delightful innovations of form and content. I really hope it wins. You can get Calypso here.
The others are all much shorter.
2) Your Visiting Dragon, by Devan Barlow. Third stanza:
Be prepared for your visiting dragon to steal
your scarves, your spoons, your salt shakers
or anything else that captures their fancy
They will, nearly always,
leave them behind at season’s end
Most of these finalists are telling narrative stories; I liked the way that this one is more of a situation, not particularly trying to have a plot. Poetry can be more than stories in verse. (OK, my top vote is going to a story in verse.)
3) We Drink Lava, by Ai Jiang. Third stanza:
It was clear why humans could not drink
lava like we, so unaccepting of their pasts,
so much fear for their futures, where we find
enjoyment experiencing both in the present.
Because to us, that is all that matters.
An interesting portrayal of human emotions and passions as seen and interpreted by lava-drinking gods.
4) A War of Words, by Marie Brennan. Third stanza:
Today it was the water—
the big water that divides us—
we’re losing more and more,
more battles, more words,
all gone across the water I can’t name anymore
because it belongs to them now,
the—
what are they—
I had a word for them this morning, I know it—
A story about words being stolen, or perhaps rather raided, which works effectively as a poem.
5) Ever Noir, by Mari Ness. Third section (arguably):
Sometimes they spill a golden coin or two,
or seven tarnished silver coins. Or a shirt
woven from nettles. Can turn you from a bird,
they say. Or maybe the other way around. A
golden ring that never fits. Boots with
iron soles. A shard from a shattered slipper.
I was not so sure about this, a merger of three different literary discourses – fairy tales, noir and poetry. It’s ambitious and it didn’t quite work for me.
6) there are no taxis for the dead, by Angela Liu. Third stanza:
At home, you don’t knock, just
ping the paper lanterns, one after the other
like fireflies seeking patterns in summer heat. You sink
I’m sorry, I really didn’t understand what this was about. Some of the individual pieces, sure, but they did not make a whole picture for me.
Speculative Poetry Award
A team of activists have put a lot of work into putting the case for a permanent Best Poem Hugo. The main difference with this year’s special award is that they propose a minimum of one line rather than three. The brief version of their proposal is in item F12 (pages 40 and 41) of the Business Meeting agenda; they have published longer argumentation at the PoetryHugo.com website.
I admire their commitment, but I am probably voting against, because I feel that there are already too many Hugo categories, and I would like to see the Business Meeting trimming some of the excess before adding yet again to the burdens of Hugo administrators.
This is one of a series of posts about the 2025 World Science Fiction Society Business Meeting. They are all tagged bm2025.
2025 WSFS Business meeting posts:
Mark Protection Committee Report
Investigation Committee on the 2023 Hugo Awards report
Software Committee
Hugo Administration Process Committee report
Business Meeting Study Group
C1, C2, C3, C4
C5
D1, D2, D3
D4
D5, D6
D7, D8
D9, D10, D11, D12
E1, E2
E3, E4, E5
E6
E7
E8
E9
F1, F2
F3, F4, F5, F6
F7, F8
F9, F10
F11
F12
F13
F14, F15
F16, F17, F18, F19
F20
F21
F22