It Begins With Birds in Flight
It begins with birds in flight, with birds landing, taking off, and she, the woman, watching trees at the city’s edge. It begins with watching birds, in the trees, and in its midde, later, there is a kitchen, and the woman stands, the teakettle’s small hard tears of water dripping onto her fingers. The woman stands, the kitchen waits, the birds have gone, and the house, struck by the innocent finery of a silent, standing woman, takes itself out for a spell. A spell of rest. The woman pours, the kettle’s whistle quiet now. It ends with the woman, sitting, fine and silent, sitting, straight and awkward, angles and corners pointing towards the sides. It ends with birds, tapping on the window, tapping and scratching, and the woman, her head up, her tea aside. It ends with the woman, birds tapping at the window, smiling.
By Tania Hershman
Tania Hershman (www.taniahershman.com) is a former science journalist originally from London. After 15 years in Jerusalem, she and her partner are relocating to Bristol. Commended by the judges of the 2009 Orange Award for New Writers, her first short story collection, The White Road and Other Stories (www.thewhiteroadandotherstories.com), is published by Salt Modern Fiction. Her short stories have been published in print and online, in publications including PANK magazine, Smokelong Quarterly, Drunk and Lonely Men, Eyeshot, Literary Fever, Riptide, Cafe Irreal, the Hiss Quarterly, Front&Centre, Vestal Review, and Transmission, and Riffing on Strings, an anthology of fiction inspired by String Theory. She has had three stories broadcast on BBC Radio 4. Tania is the winner of the Binnacle’s 2009 Ultra Short Competition and European regional winner of the 2008 Commonwealth Broadcasting Association’s short story competition. She is the founder and editor of The Short Review, (www.theshortreview.com), a site dedicated to reviewing short story collections and anthologies.
© 2009, Metazen. All rights reserved.
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