The Plantain
“A large plantain rested on a bullock dray. Its fronds were bundled up and tied with rice-straw ropes, and its root-ball was wound with another rope and decorated with a few celebratory sprigs of fern fronds and strips of white blessing paper cunningly folded.…”
>> Read the story in Necessary Fiction
The Plum Rains
“She came back alone after first prayers and slid open her white paper doors. Misty drizzle filled the dense cedar forest surrounding the nunnery. The inside walls of her room were tacky with the damp, the tatami mats slick with it, and a faint gray-green dusting furred the brocade mat-bindings. It was a tired season, a time of melancholy wistfulness.…”
>> Read the story in Wag’s Revue
Lightness
“Old Master Bashō was dead, and he had left behind no leader with sufficient stature to sustain his manner. The gate would be shut, house shutters attached, and haikai poets who had once sought his advice and approval would disperse like dry leaves blown in an autumn gale.…”
>> Read the story in Cerise Press
Bushclover and the Moon
“The Lesser Tada’s assignations teahouse had been among the first to promote young serving maids as peony girls, selecting those with a lively manner and sweet disposition, outfitting them in gaudy robes then encouraging them to feel emotions and share their feelings widely.…”
>> Read the story in Cerise Press
The Black Feathers Road
“The Hell-kite wanted to talk about technique. He said he had a sense of how to fight with a long sword but wasn’t sure if his style looked right. What he needed to know was the correct method for delivering a killing blow. He showed him what he meant, carving great sloppy arcs in the air with his naked blade and delighted by the display until Hasegawa told him he looked like a drunken farmer swinging a grain-flail.…”
>> Read the story in Eclectica
Solitary Rambler On the Withered Moor
“The disgraced samurai and the weedy little pleasure provider matched each other stanza for stanza; and while Hasegawa’s reading of old poetry anthologies resulted in links that reverberated with the muted echos of ancient temple bells, Ohasu was the one who found a surprising new music in the patterns emerging.…”
>> Read the story in Connotation Press
The Palace Orphan
“The rogue samurai said he did not believe that there was a place for him other than the one he occupied. He said he awoke to the sun in the morning and went to sleep with the moon at night. He said he’d heard things said. Promises and justifications and warnings. But he’d never found anything he thought more true than the simple assurance that when spring comes, grass grows by itself.…”
>> Read the story in Prime Number