David C. Kopaska-Merkel is the editor of Dreams and Nightmares and the Science Fiction Poetry Association's journal, Star*Line. He had sold poems and stories and reviews to many places, including Night Cry, Eldritch Tales, Xenophilia, Space and Time, and Alpha Dimension. By day he's a geolo gist; he's co-authored a sedimentology textbook, and published papers on trilobites, oil and gas reservoir rocks, and fossil reefs. He lives in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Dark Planet is designed and edited by Lucy A. Snyder. If you spot any errors, or if you have any comments, please contact her at lusnyde@cyberus.ca. All materials copyright 1996-1998 by their respective creators. No stories, articles, poems or images from this webzine may be posted or published without the written consent of their creator(s).

Happy Birthday, Mr. Senator! by David C. Kopaska-Merkel they filled the night with terrors and opened every eye to a hideous garden -- his sores were the blinking eyes of a fallen god as he shuffled to the door. There was something swelling beneath the skin, which peeled back like an eye unlidding to disgorge a bright orange fluid like a poisoned stream running down his legs splashing and flowing burning the webs between his toes filling the house like a hot wind and scaring the crap out of the magazine salesmen.