Winged Seeds

She whispered to them all that night, filling their skulls with her dreams. She woke just before dawn, imagining she still stood in a dark wood, cupping her hands to catch winged seeds. The waxing moon lingered as a gold cocoon in the western sky. At sunrise, she led the children to the open door. She looked down proudly at their lengthening branches and leafy crowns. When they saw the six deep holes, they understood. They leaped from the stairs into their marked places, raising their arms to the sun.

Excerpt from "Parchment and Twigs," first published in Text: Ur -- The New Book of Masks, then in Stirring the Mirror. Picture of maple seeds, my yard, 5/1/08.

Text: Ur - The New Book of Masks

Text: Ur--The New Book of Masks, edited by Forrest Aguirre, winner of a World Fantasy Award, is a collection of experimental and speculative fiction and fantasy from Raw Dog Screaming Press. On the press' Web site, the anthology is described as "a beautifully surreal masquerade" and a "hallucinogenic spectacle." Just look at the wild cover art by Carrie Ann Baade -- that riveting image is what invites you inside, into the odd worlds of these twenty stories. I have a few short hybrid pieces included in the anthology, which are now part of Stirring the Mirror: "Parchment and Twigs," "No Mooing in the Moonlight," and "Documenting My Abduction."

Authors contributing to Text: Ur are Brian Evenson, Rikki Ducornet, Lance Olsen, Tamar Yellin, Terese Svoboda, Jay Lake/Ruth Nestvold, Sarah Totton, Joshua Cohen, E. Sedia, Nadia Gregor, Darren Speegle, Tom Miller, Joe Murphy, Eric Schaller, Catherine Kasper, Christine Boyka Kluge, Toiya Kristen Finley, and Jason Erik Lundberg.

Publishers Weekly calls the collection "boldly original." Booklist says "stories here display remarkable degrees of creativity and craftsmanship." In Tangent, Text: Ur was described as "experimental, literate, at times cerebral, and overall well-crafted strangeness."

Cover art by Carrie Ann Baade used with permission from Raw Dog Screaming Press.