Water Crepe

This is a collection of prose about rivers, time, and fabric. Shui hu is the fine wrinkles that wind kneads into the water's surface, and it is also the old books' name for crepe—a silk so light and thin that you can almost hear it breathe. What this book writes about is precisely this state between the tangible and the intangible. With a delicate, almost transparent touch, the author writes of mist on distant mountains, the smell of camphor in an old wardrobe, the routes ants take when moving house before the rainy season arrives, and those dusks soaked through by rain. She writes of a bolt of plain crepe left deep in the attic, how its satin surface fades from moon-white to ivory, how its warp and weft loosen thread by thread, like memory letting go of the past it once held tight. She writes of the traces left by river water spilling over stone steps, the sound of silkworms biting through mulberry leaves, the process by which a brass button slowly grows green rust in the dark. This is not a story about any one person, but about the faint glimmer emitted by all things about to pass away at the moment they pass—like a dragonfly skimming the water's surface, like glaze flowing in the kiln fire, like a piece of cloth never cut, breathing alone in the dark. — Description from novelcodex.orgFull novel: Water Crepe — read the rest free on N​o⁠v​e⁠l​C⁠o​d⁠e​x⁠.​o⁠r​g⁠