In February: “Viktor Aurelius – On Gothic Poetry” and HWA Horror Poetry Showcase

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The Horror Poetry Showcase is back!

To celebrate National Poetry Month, the Horror Writers Association will be holding their second annual HWA Horror Poetry Showcase in April 2015.

Open to all poets, the Showcase will be accepting submissions throughout the month of April with four poems chosen by HWA member judges to be honored on the HWA website.

Submission Guidelines:

Submissions will be accepted via Submittable from April 1-30, 2015 and all rights will remain with the poets. Those interested in submitting should visit www.horror.org on or after April 1 to access the submissions link. Submissions are open to all, whether HWA members or not.

We are looking for more than “blood, guts, worms,” etc. Just being “icky” isn’t enough. Poetry up to fifty lines. Free verse preferred; (hint: no forced rhyme or clichés). Unpublished poems only (though previously published poets are, of course, welcome). For example, these are some contemporary poets of darkness that we admire: Wendy Rathbone, Marge Simon, Mary Turzillo, Bruce Boston, Gary Clark. Previous winners include Stephanie Wytovich, Robert Borski, Valerie Grice, and Ann K. Schwader.

In addition, at the judge’s discretion, an electronic chapbook of qualifying poems will be considered for publication under the aegis of HWA. Each poem chosen for publication will be paid $5.

For the 2015 Showcase the judges will be Linda Addison, Peter Adam Salomon, and Heather Graham.

And now, our monthly interview

Viktor Aurelius enjoys reciting Gothic Poetry, Dark Stories and interviewing guests on his Blog Talk Radio show “Whispers in the Dark” and spends most of his time writing, directing and producing Audio Dramas. He has voiced Computer Games, Videos, Documentaries, Cartoons and MANY Audio Productions!

But it is Viktor’s unique take on Gothic Poetry that the Poetry Page wanted to explore. For with his Blog Talk Radio show, Viktor not only shines a spotlight on Horror/Dark/Gothic poetry, he virtually recreates it. While introducing his audience to numerous horror authors and poets, he also records their poetry, with incredible production values and fantastic results. (See the links at the end of the interview for examples.)

HWA: You describe yourself as ‘the 2000 year old vampire,’ what’s the story behind that?

VA: Back in 1996 I was a huge fan of the TV show “Forever Knight” (I still am). It was about a 700 year old Vampire who became a police detective in Toronto to atone for all the evil he had done. His Sire (The 2000 year old Vampire Master who made him a Vampire) LaCroix followed him and taunted him for centuries, trying to lure him back to his Vampire ways. In the show, Nick (The Vampire Cop) finds that his old Master has set up residence in Toronto on late night Radio. He would broadcast messages to Nick via poems and stories. I was such a fan that I started doing my own version of LaCroix (who went by the name the Nightcrawler on the air). A group of friends and I recorded several parodies and dramas that we wrote and produced. We did that for several years and had quite a fan following after the show went off the air.

We even met some of the stars of the show at a convention in 1997 and I did my impression for Nigel Bennett (who played LaCroix) and he very much approved of it! He even took me aside and told me that since he wasn’t using the character anymore that I had his blessing to continue doing what we did. In 2004 the group disbanded and I began to miss the Character. I created a Yahoo Group where my fans could hear me perform stories and poems. They even wrote things for me to perform. I did answering machine messages, holiday greetings, classic poems (romantic and Gothic) and even wrote quite a few of my own: Stories, Poems, Monologues, etc – all in the character voice. I had been asked to begin my own radio show and actually BE LaCroix live on the air. At the time I didn’t know how to do that.

A few years later, Lanaia Lee (Poet, Author) who had been in my fan group since the beginning was being interviewed on a few Blog Talk Radio shows and they wanted to hear her poems and stories. So she would have them play my recordings of her work. I became popular and they had us both on live interviews together. I stayed in character and called myself the 2000 year old Vampire because I legally could not use the name LaCroix or Nightcrawler in anything other than fan works and parodies under fair-use. Lanaia wrote a story claiming that I was Marcus Aurelius who was bitten by a bat and became a Vampire. I liked that idea because my real middle name is Aurelio (my Grandfather’s name) and the Latin “Aurelius” sounded great! But my addition to the history was that once Marcus Aurelius had been Victorious over Death he re-named himself Viktor Aurelius! She then proposed that we start our own radio show and “Whispers in the Dark” was born. The name “Whispers in the Dark” was from a contest that I had with my yahoo group to name the Annual CDs I would create for my fans of the poems/stories I did. The winning entry was “Whispers in the Dark” because of the breathy way I recorded in the Vampire Master’s voice.

Lanaia Lee’s health didn’t allow her to keep up with the show’s schedule and by that time (2010) I had been asked to be a voice actor in a few Audio Productions, I did a cartoon (“Ninja Cat” where I play the Evil Dr. Dog), I had met with a few other voice actors and began writing my own Audio Drama “Lilith’s Children” and I even asked the actor who played Ninja Cat “Gary Washington” to be the star of my series! He played the Angel Elias. After the first episode premiered in 2011, the company who had originally featured it was “frightened by the adult language” and “my free range of producing/directing my very first Audio Play”, I quit and moved to Jeff Nile’s site and have been there ever since. Jeff became my co-host on my radio show and we also began producing brand new Audio Plays after I completed the 10-Episode “Lilith’s Children” story. The series has since been hailed as a “Tolkien-esque Saga – especially for my very first one”! Jeff and I then co-produced several episodes of “Jeff Niles Presents” a sort of “Twilight Zone” anthology, “Victoria! Empress of the Universe” my current Steam Punk saga, “Lance Hardwick Mysteries” my 1940’s “tongue-in-Cheek” Radio Play and more. I have even been a voice actor in many other companies Audio works, computer/online games and a UFO Mockumentary which will be coming out soon.

But being a poet? I don’t know. In some ways it is a strange question to answer because I think of poetry as something I do rather than something I am. It is another way of expressing thought. I did find though, when I first started writing poetry, that it forced me to view the world slantwise. Poetry has a magic force to it: it attempts to convey to the reader through a form that essentially short-circuits the logic of the brain. So the hardest thing about being a poet is mastering the craft, I suppose, learning to experiment with form, learning to understand the resonance of words so that they can mean in as many ways as possible.

HWA: With “Whispers In The Dark” and other blog talk radio enterprises, you’ve established a tremendous avenue for the promotion and dissemination of dark/horror poetry. What prompted the creation of “Whispers” and what do you envision for the future of the show?

VA: Originally the show was created to promote Gothic and romantic poetry, and dark stories but it soon grew into a place where poets, authors and others could come on the air and promote their writing. At first it was just a guest poet and I chatting and playing mp3s of the pre-recorded productions I would create of their writing, with music and sound FX. We did that for quite a while but the work of pre-recording poems and stories (which each one takes a few hours to produce) had started to interfere with my voice acting, writing and producing. So we began booking authors, artists and comic book writers so that we could simply chat and promote their work. We still do shows with pre-recorded material but I try to spread them out now. October is my busiest month because EVERYBODY wants the Vampire recording their poems and stories! So I book October shows many months in advance. The past 2 Octobers were nearly 3 shows a week and very hectic! We had multiple shows for Horror Anthologies with 8 to 10 guests with an allotted time to chat and in a two hour show that is pretty nerve-wracking. Luckily I have friends who pitch in and schedule these shows, get the info from the guests and get them to understand what time they need to be on the air if they are in different time zones. Mary G. Fortier has been a GREAT help in scheduling these shows for me. I couldn’t do them without her. Even though I used to do everything all by myself until July of 2014. We’ve had guests from all over the US, Canada, England, Ireland, Scotland, Belgium, Australia and New Zealand! The Horror Anthology shows are the best shows we have ever done on “Whispers in the Dark”! But I simply cannot keep the pace that I did last year. This is why I took some time off. We will return live in February 2015 with a single weekly show.

HWA: Any advice for people looking to break into the blog talk radio world?

VA: It’s not hard at all. If you want to try it out and do a 30 minute show, it’s free. You can do a longer show 2 hours plus but there is a fee. It’s an easy process by phone. Guests can call in too. For the longer shows you can use Skype for all calls. I would definitely recommend trying it. All I did was set up a show, set up a Facebook page for it and self-promote. The nice thing about doing your own show is total freedom to do what you want. Base the show on whatever subject is near and dear to you. Get a few friends to do the show with you. Try it for free for a while and then you will get a following. After that, guests will contact you soon enough.

HWA: Who are your favorite dark/horror poets? Favorite poems?

VA: I love Dark/horror and also romantic poetry. Classics such as: Poe, Byron, Rossetti, Browning, Shakespeare, Yeats, and there are more. But I have had so many new poets who have been on my show for years who are finally getting some notice. Some of them self-publish but a few have gotten their work in magazines and anthologies. They are all extremely talented. Check out my shows that feature Dark Poetry! And if you love Horror prose – there are many shows that will chill your very bones!

HWA: What is your own poetry like? Would you be willing to share a poem or two?

VA: There was a short period where I was writing poetry almost every day. My fan group members were sending me their work and I tried to match the amount with my own. I was recently asked if I would be interested in publishing a book of my poetry and stories. I will look into it this year. They’ve sat for far too long.

Here are two that I wrote quite a while ago. The first one is “Ghost”. One of my guests last year surprised me by reciting it on my show for me. I was astonished that she knew of my work!

Ghost

A ghostly shape appeared one night,
Amorphous, pale, composed of light.
I let it move about my house.
It scurried softly as a mouse.

When all at once it turned to me.
Frightened, scared I wished to flee.
It held out-stretched a pale white hand,
I took it, it was soft as sand.

I heard it speak, no mouth I saw,
It said, “Hold on,” and we did fall.
Through the floor, though earth and stone,
Praise be, I was not alone!

It showed me graves, Gentile and Jew,
We looked in mausoleums too.
The tombs of kings and common men,
The message clearly struck me then.

Every human, small and great,
Each will die, that is their fate.
To turn to dust and back to Earth,
It is predestined from their birth.

I thanked the ghost as we did roam,
And asked him now to take me home.
“But we are home,” he just replied,
“Don’t you know that you had died?”

“Dead?” I asked, “How can this be?”
“Look at yourself and you will see.”
I peered down, aghast with fright,
Amorphous, pale, composed of light.

 

The Songs of the Dead

The songs in my head, are the songs of the Dead.
They fill up my mind, and help me unwind.
I see them at night, they are such a fright,
in stately attire, ‘round a pit filled with fire.
They sing and they dance, they howl and they prance.
The lyrics they sing, are of their new king.
Dark tales they are told, of this King fierce and bold.
He sits on a throne, constructed of bone.
His regal attire, and a ring of sapphire,
are the signs of his rank, and how far he sank.
For he was once like me, a man strong and free,
but his sins were so great, that they sealed his fate.
When he died and he fell, he was greeted in hell.
The dead there did sing, and made him their king.
“What honor is this?” he asked with a hiss.
“Oh, Master, you jest!”, and they await his behest.
“I am not the King, of whom you do sing.
This throne and attire, I do not desire.
Why am I so blessed, to now be your guest?”
“Please let us explain, why here you do reign.
On your throne here you sit, above the great pit.
To witness the plight, of those banished from light,
You are destined to stay and not look away.
Your hell this will be, for eternity.

The songs in my head, are the songs of the dead.
They are singing with glee, for a throne awaits me.

HWA: Finally, what’s next for you?

VA: I am always busy. Writing, producing, acting. The radio shows will continue, we have shows scheduled several months in advance. I am currently writing the season finale of “Victoria! Empress of the Universe” which will be released in Late February or early March 2015. We’ve begun a partnership with a wonderful writer, Mark Slade. We just produced one of his stories “Seeing Red” as a Jeff Niles Presents story and in Early February we will be releasing “Elixir” a Vampire story set in the Old West. Mark has been in contact with his local Public Radio station about airing our work. That would be fun! If it goes well I will look into approaching more Radio Stations to air our productions.

I am always creating! I have at least 30 episode ideas for “Lance Hardwick Mysteries”, a second season for “Victoria! Empress of the Universe” and several other stories that will eventually be produced. I have so many ideas and just not enough time to make them all happen. I would love to gather a production team to tackle some of the work but since it is all made for fun and no profit is made and no payments for work are given – it looks like Jeff Niles and I will continue to do the workload for ourselves. We’ve had many, many actors who graciously give their time and talent to make our productions come to life! Without their work our words would never be heard. I hope to continue doing what I am doing for a very long time to come. As long as I have ideas, I will be producing them! I really should once again, thank my co-host and co-producer Jeff Niles for his tireless work, his gracious help and his fantastic acting ability! The man has been there everyday for me and we live 1000 miles away from one another – yet we chat every single day.

Please check out our productions at: http://the4077th.blogspot.com/

Check out “The 2000 Year Old Vampire” reciting poems and stories on his website: http://viktoraurelius.com/whispers-from-the-voice/

Videos of his voice work can be found here: http://viktoraurelius.com/videos-from-the-voice/

Viktor’s Blog Talk Radio show “Whispers in the Dark” is found at: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/viktoraurelius

And he is found on Facebook at all the following links:

https://www.facebook.com/viktoraurelius

https://www.facebook.com/whispersradio

https://www.facebook.com/AllBetterAudio

https://www.facebook.com/LilithsChildren

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Victoria-Empress-of-the-Universe/310323798988905

https://www.facebook.com/LanceHardwickMysteries

And his Facebook Fan page is here: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Viktor-Aurelius/268238390058

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