January 2026 | fiction
The general’s family selects an earth spirit for his mausoleum
Tang Dynasty, China
May I say you bring great honor to the artisans of our studio by seeking our earth spirits for the general’s tomb?
The widow, sitting on a stone bench with her two sons, nodded solemnly at the ceramic workshop director.
The general is much admired as a fierce defender of the empire. The story of how he led the charge of his outnumbered troops against the rebel army will be passed down from generation to generation. Who can help but be thrilled by the way he urged his steed forward alone against the enemy line, slashing his way through stunned warriors, straight for the opposing general? One must marvel at his audacity and his courage as he vanquished the enemy’s leader, chopped off his head, tied it to his horse’s mane and rode along the front lines, terrifying the enemy and rallying his men to a bloody and glorious victory.
The widow turned pale. The older son gave a slight cough.
My apologies. Of course, you would prefer in this time to remember the general as the loving and devoted father and husband I am sure he was when not on the battlefield.
The widow stared down at her feet.
May I show you a few examples of earth spirits created by our artisans? Our grave-quelling spirits stand guard at the entrances of the tombs of hundreds of the honored dead, the first choice of emperors and noblemen. As you can see, our statues are finished with tri-colored Sancai glaze and come in many designs to ward off malevolent spirts. Our earth spirits combine the features of numerous animals into a figure to inspire fear in any enemy – tiger fangs, eagle talons, dragon tails. A warrior like the general with a lifetime of heroic deeds must have left many enemies defeated and broken. I fear their spirits could seek revenge in the afterlife. We must prevent these spirits from disturbing the peace of
the general so he will be a source of blessing and good fortune to what we all wish to be many generations of descendants.
The two sons nodded vigorously.
When selecting a design, it is important to remember our figures do more than protect against malevolent spirits getting in – they also prevent the spirit of the departed from getting out.
The widow drew a sharp breath.
Keep in mind that each of us has two souls. The soul that embodies our intellect, our spiritual self, ascends into the heavens. Our other soul, the one that animates our bodies, fuels our emotions, drives our earthly desires, stays with the body. Our earth spirits are crafted to keep these souls from leaving their tombs and walking the earth, re-visiting where they once lived and drawing near those with whom their lives intertwined.
The younger son and the widow looked at each other with alarm.
May I presume to suggest you consider our strongest and most fearsome figure? It is a little more costly, but it is the most powerful of all our earth spirits. I believe it befits a man of the general’s character and reputation. It has three horns growing from its head, the snout and fangs of a boar, and muscular arms and legs that end in deadly claws. A venomous snake encircles its arm. And, its entire body is engulfed in flames. The final touch is that it stands astride the body of a defeated monster subdued by its powers. I believe such an earth spirit will quell any disturbance and allow the general to sleep in the peace he deserves and for which you pray.
The older son leaned forward. Yes, our family will take two of those.
Robert Miner
Robert Miner is a Houston-based writer. He is a former political consultant who works in government affairs on energy policy. Follow him @robertminerpoetry on Instagram.
January 2026 | fiction
My Daddy Was an Omnivore
He drank coffee in the wee hours long before the sun oozed its way up over the hardwoods at the end of the property. He played Solitaire and smoked Camels before he woke all of us up to begin our day. My mother had to be at work by 7. Daddy took care of her like a cake maker, frosting her sides with a thick coating of meringuelike candy, opening the door of my bedroom, asking the same question: What would you like for breakfast? I slept like a bear cub, not sure who this man was interrupting my dreams about girls and flying boomerangs with dogs and wispy clouds. What? I’d ask. Denver omelet or pancakes? One day when I came home from playing down at the railroad tracks with my buddies, I found him crouching in the garden pulling up greenery and placing it in a Tupperware bowl. Dandelions, wild onions, unidentified grass and weeds What are you doing that for? I asked. This is dinner tonight. It’ll be great with those pork chops you like. As it turned out, the salad greens from the backyard weren’t so good for most of the family. My sister refused to touch them, and my mother gagged. Since he always seemed to like me, I decided to humor him and have a taste. Explosion on my tongue, in the back of my throat. Fireworks! No meat required. Transformation like spine Unfriending notochord, transmitting blasts of bovine deliciousness into the atmosphere. I am wild and grazer and hologram of urban sunsets, their lemon essence and citrus aftertaste diffusing into my soul. My mother demanded spaghetti and handmade meatballs. My sister didn’t care because she was in love with a man from the plastic factory. And Trixie, the terrier, ate everything she was offered. I pushed my pork chop aside that evening, but my father urged Don’t give it up…yet. You need both hands to make your dreams come true.
John Dorroh
John Dorroh likes to travel. He often ends up in other people’s kitchens, sharing culinary tidbits and tall tales. “Learning about cultures begins with the food,” he asserts. Six of his poems were nominated for Best of the Net. Hundreds of others appeared in journals such as Feral, River Heron, Burningword, Kissing Dynamite, North Dakota Quarterly, Penstricken, and North of Oxford. He’s had a book of micro fiction and two chapbooks of poetry published in recent years. Once he was awarded Editor’s Choice Award for a regional journal and received enough money for a sushi dinner for two.
January 2026 | fiction
One Day in the Life of Donna DeSimone
Donna, you will never become less deaf, her audiologist informs. Keep learning, she encourages herself. In ASL she has reached the letter L. Keep living. She buses down to Pike Place Market to purchase potatoes and greens, maybe collard. Downtown, she deboards into the midst of an ICE raid. Masked goons are throwing a well-dressed, screaming woman to the asphalt. People are holding up phone cameras, yelling Fuck you! Get out! A tall man is photographing. She knows that old camera. Husband of her youth. Why had she left him? Henry! He looks up. Donna! she sees his mouth say.
Priscilla Long
Priscilla Long is author of nine books including Cartographies of Home: Poems (MoonPath Press, 2026) and On Spaces and Colors (University of New Mexico Press, 2026). Her work has appeared in publications such as The Hudson Review, The Southern Review, and The American Scholar. Her awards include a National Magazine Award and ten of her essays have been honored as “notable” in various years of Best American Essays. She has an MFA from the University of Washington and grew up on a dairy farm on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. To learn more, go to www.priscillalong.com.
January 2026 | fiction
Clockwise
Quite late into my pregnancy, the day I eventually did pregnancy tests and all three came out positive (Surprise! I’m here!), my husband said he’d always yearned to be a father, (Have I developed something new? These are voices outside!), a statement of desired fatherhood that came as a shock, or, let’s say, a seven-degree alarm on a scale of zero to ten, (Water, water, wateeerrrr, swimming in a blister) because my husband used to say it’s crazy to bring a baby to this world, and I believed he understood my point and accepted my decision, though he always beamed at babies and said to fathers they were lucky, so I guess (she says: I will change diapers, will hear a baby cry, will be like my tired girl friends), his huge capacity of devotion had been seeking a route, which didn’t pass solely through me, (Here I am! Feel me. I’ll kick a little, see? Again! Again! Happy?), or maybe not at all through me or anyone, yet, because in his youth, my husband credited people with more generosity than they actually had, lost his family in a war and that pain squandered his capacity for love (A head against my kicking leg. Father! A hand over my head. Mother!) or so he thought, but his love for our child grew high and bright like wheat in the following months, and after all he did trust my contribution to his child, and this grew into a plant of love between us too, and I was afraid to lose it when the baby came out, so I wanted to turn the clock back (something’s wrong, what’s wrong, I’ll see you soon, Mother, Father, I promise! I’ll be yours, I want out.), but when the baby was born, and light I didn’t know existed within me burst out too, there we were, the three of us, and the clock, for all I cared, could go on and never stop.
Avital Gad-Cykman
Avital Gad-Cykman is the author of the story collections Light Reflection Over Blues (Ravenna Press) and Life In, Life Out (Matter Press). She is the winner of Margaret Atwood Studies Magazine Prize and The Hawthorne Citation Short Story Contest. Her stories appear in The Dr. Eckleburg Review, Iron Horse Review, Prairie Schooner, Ambit, McSweeney’s Quarterly, and Michigan Quarterly, among others. They have been included twice in Best Short Fictions, W.W. Norton’s Flash Fiction International anthology, and Best Microfiction 2025. She lives in Brazil and holds a PhD in English Literature, focused on minorities, gender, and trauma.
January 2026 | fiction
Test
This is a test. A heartbeat test. A bloodbeat test. My doctor tells me I’m going to die. This is certain. I want to tell the doctor it’s OK
My doctor is a quack. Quick homemade remedies — everything to cure halitosis and eczema. You can’t leave his office without buying.
****
My husband is in love with another woman. This is not a test. My heartbeat knows it. My bloodbeat knows it. My husband is going to leave me. This is certain I want to tell my husband it’s OK
My husband is a jerk. Quick homemade remedies of stink flowers and empty promises. You can’t leave an argument without buying.
***
I’m heading into loveless now and lifeless now. I am almost not a patient I am almost not a wife. There is no test for this, I just know it. There is nothing I can buy that will change anything. I want to tell myself it’s OK.
Francine Witte
Francine Witte is a flash fiction writer and poet, and the author of the flash collection RADIO WATER. Her newest poetry book, Some Distant Pin of Light, has just been published by Cervena Barva Press. Her work has been widely published, and she is a recent recipient of a Pushcart Prize. She lives in New York City. Please visit her website francinewitte.com. She can be found on social media @francinewitte.
January 2026 | fiction
Phoebe Sneezed and Smelled Bacon
Phoebe sneezed and smelled bacon. “What is this?” Nobody else was home and hadn’t been for four days so it couldn’t be a lingering smell. It was distinct. Bacon.
“I’m gonna look this up,” she said aloud to herself. It should be understood that Phoebe talked a lot to herself. You might say it was a function of being older and living alone, but that wouldn’t be true. She had always talked to herself, rather enjoying the conversations.
Funny, because when she sat down to write, she didn’t transcribe the words in her brain. Instead, she saw a picture and just wrote down what was happening. Sometimes it was a still. Sometimes, an actual movie. Even her dreams, back in the day when she had them every night and remembered them. She was pretty sure she still had them, just that trauma made her unable to recall more than a dozen over the past twenty years.
But smelling bacon. This was new. She had always had a great nose and would often detect things that people around her said they didn’t smell. She had always thought she was catching a whiff of something on a draft of air blowing in from somewhere. Sometimes she would speculate from where and write a little story.
But that was when she lived in the midst of a family and there were the usual comings and goings of busy people. Now, Phoebe recognized the responses of a solitary older person, and a certain tendency toward hypochondria. As soon as she had a twinge or a twist that was even the slightest tad unusual, she was sure she had something.
The sneeze smell. She went to Google, surprised to find answers to her exact query What does it mean when you sneeze and then smell bacon? “This is too easy,” her skeptical self verbalized. The dog was in the room so she looked over toward the sweet creature. “How could it be a thing that people might smell bacon when they sneeze? This has to be a tailored AI response.”
Still, she kept reading and discovered a condition called phantosmia where people do become aware of scents after a sneeze. “Ooh, I love the word.” The dog paid little attention.
Faithful Google went on to tell her that it was probably meaningless, a chance triggering of some olfactory nerves. “How do they come together to smell like bacon?” she asked the screen. Scrolling informed her it could be a symptom of a seizure if it didn’t go away in a couple of days.
“Hmmm,” Phoebe said. “Do I have some sort of precondition for a seizure? Okay, I know what I’m doing, I’m speculating about all the things that happen to old people and assuming I am minutes away from something catastrophic. Well, maybe not minutes, but soon enough.”
“If I have a stroke, it better be the kind that kills me right away.”
The bacon smell disappeared. “Too bad,” she said. “I like bacon.”
Holly Redell Witte
Holly Redell Witte has been writing and publishing in newspapers and magazines for years. Turning to fiction in the last five years, she has been published in Blood+Honey, Screamin Mamas, Sudden Flash, the Red Wheelbarrow Anthology, An Unsuspected Place, and a forthcoming anthology benefiting victims of the LA fires. She workshopped her short fiction and a novel at the Yale Writers’ Workshop, 2023 and ’24.
