I’m thrilled I got a chance to have been published in the granddaddy of all science fiction magazines, Amazing Stories, which started way back in 1926. I only wish it had been more than a mere 28 words, since the mag is no longer being published, and I’ll never get another shot.
How did I end up with only 28 words in the September 1981 issue? Because “Designer Kids” … was a limerick.
Here it is in its entirety:
In the future, a magnate of means,
Who desires “that look” for his teens,
If he knows the score,
Then some years before,
He’ll purchase some Vanderbilt genes.
This isn’t a poem that’s aged well, since it requires a knowledge of Gloria Vanderbilt “jeans” to get the pun of it all. But still, it was in the magazine founded by Hugo Gernsback, the spiritual father of science fiction, so whatever got me in its pages, to repeat—I’m thrilled!