Last Drink Bird Head, of course!

Birds have been a fraught subject in my family. We are all birders, yet our history with these animals is littered with tragic or embarrassing episodes. My father backed his truck over our duck, Jesus, and his own pet crow was shot off a fencepost by a random stranger in a pick-up. My grandmother kept a deceased parrot in the freezer for years, meaning to have it stuffed; my grandfather accidentally shredded his beloved pet rooster with his tractor.

A thin, cold, sardonic man, Pop-pop expressed more emotion over Diego's death than any of us had seen from him in a lifetime.

In my life as an environmental educator, I have been bitten by all the species mentioned above, as well as by a barred owl and a vulture (though in both cases I was wearing a leather glove).

It is my hope that having a story in the Last Drink Bird Head anthology will inaugurate a new era of forgiveness and understanding between my kin and class Aves.



The original idea for this anthology came from a mildly disturbing piece of surrealist art done by a friend of the editor, Jeff VanderMeer. Jeff wrote the first Last Drink Bird Head story, then decided that more Last Drink Bird Head stories must be written. The assignment, which I received by email from Jeff, a teacher of mine at Clarion, was to write a story about Last Drink Bird Head in under 500 words.

You know. Last Drink Bird Head.

There are a number of reasons why this anthology rocks. Here are a few:

• Writers I love, like Matthew Cheney, Jeffrey Ford, Ellen Kushner, Caleb Wilson, Desirina Boskovich, Kari O'Connor, and Ramsey Shehadeh are represented here.

• The design is by John Coulthart, whose blog, feuilleton, is one of my favorites.

• The proceeds go to ProLiteracy.

• The world needs more surrealism.

Last Drink Bird Head is available here. My story is "The Accomplished Birder's Guide to Overcoming Rejection."