"Inkblot Succubus" by Nicole Sixx is a one-page poem with a red-and-black illustration of an inkblot in the background. The black inkblot looks like a cross-section of a brain. Ms. Sixx's lines of verse are centered on the page, and so they are as symmetrical as their subject. There is imagery in this work of rot and decay, murder, too. In the lines: "I take a drag/The drag takes me," there is a faint echo of the famous Nietzsche quote:
"Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And when you look long into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you."
We haven't had either Nietzsche or Fort for a while in the Cosmic Horror Issue, but with the appearance of the unexplained lights in the sky in "Mozaika"--is there an extraterrestrial invasion going on?--and the echo of Nietzsche here, maybe those two men haven't gone far from the thoughts of these two women. As for cosmic horror, this poem seems to be of the "Hell is other people" variety.
Nicole Sixx is a writer who has worked in the movie business, so again there is a movie-and-TV connection with the authors in this issue of Weird Tales. In 2022, she had a book or "book" of poetry published called Slow Burn. Before that she had a book of short stories with a vulgar title. You can look for that one on your own, as I do my best to avoid words like that on my blog.
Ms. Sixx's name is misspelled in the table of contents as Nicola Sixx. The Internet Speculative Fiction Database calls her Nikki Sixx, but I'm pretty sure she's not the bassist for Mötley Crüe. It sounds like she needs someone out there making corrections for her and to better represent herself in the world.
Original text copyright 2024 Terence E. Hanley
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