Sunday, February 07, 2016

"Witchy Woman"


The British writer Elkie Riches has a creepy ghost story, "Most Women do not Creep by Daylight," published in this year's Emanations 2 + 2 = 5. Here's a scene near the beginning:
Dust stirs faintly at my passing. Dust is the only thing that registers me and my persistence. I spent an age trying to rid this place of dust, to clean and please, and now in this new, darker age, I cultivate dust around me. I wear dust, I eat and breathe it, I drink it in great gasping, airless spasms. Sometimes when the afternoon is marked by a column of gold through the bedroom window, I feel the dust settle on my form - this persistent form - and I do believe if anyone were there they would see a shape made of sunlight. A woman's form suggested in curves. Maybe they would think me an angel - or whatever passed for that now. (page 195)
But she isn't an angel, not even close . . . I like that image, though, "a shape made of sunlight." Does that make her other than a "Witchy Woman"?

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