by Anne Larsen My dam remembered when Lore was a sorrel mare with a bad hock. By the time I was foaled, Lore was a dun mare faded by sun and salt water, her muzzle going grey and her eyes — well, Lore’s eyes are what they are: green and gold, like no other horse in our herd’s heritage. “Can she really see the wind, mama?” my third foal asked. “My dam said she could, but how can we know?” “Did you ever talk to her?” “Only the lead mares speak to her. Sometimes the old aunties graze by her and listen. She tells them the stories they must tell…

by David Aronlee Posted Hogtown Post Office, January 2 Dearest Priscilla, I miss you the way the daisy misses the sun. I have wonderful news. I got a job! I’m a truffle sorter at the truffle factory. Not bad for a hog from the country. I had my first day yesterday and my boss already says I have potential. I could be a shift leader within a year or maybe even a truffle hunter someday!  My friend Fred says that’s where you can make it big: with the commission from finding a big truffle cluster. Fred’s a city pig. He grew up here in Hogtown and is showing me the…

by Larry Hodges Zuk stared out the open window above her cubicle desk at the poor, hatless rats chattering and scampering about outside, digging through heaps of garbage for scraps of rotting food. She wrinkled her nose; even from here the stench was like a tail smashing into her face. Pathetic. It should be illegal to have that much fun when you’re homeless. That’s what happens when you don’t get an education! she wanted to scream, but instead just slapped her tail against the sawdust floor. Saying that would be rude. She herself had a doctorate in ratropology, but often wondered if she’d made a huge career mistake. Aerospace engineering,…

by H. Robert Barland Her scent was that of the warm grass of summer. And sunflowers. I still smell her now, I think, but the scent dwindles as does the image of her in my mind. I try to hold onto it, pull her grey furred shape into focus, but the more I try, the more she slips away. The ghost of her memory wafts through my paws liked winter fog. I wince. Concentrating… it makes my head ache. To keep her from disappearing altogether, I direct my focus elsewhere, to the machine, the Contraption. It sits a tail-length beyond the safety of my hide. The gleaming steel bar is…

by Lara Hussain Jot knew exactly what had happened to Iota: Flowerwerks had eaten him alive. Or rather, he had worked himself to death. Mice were prone to it: working to grinding exhaustion, from those who squeaked commands all day to the lowliest directors of fertilizer distribution, and even the earthworm and bee wranglers. But it was unlike Iota to disappear. He had a quiet intensity, certainly, but he would never leave something unfinished, or depart without saying goodbye. Jot’s best friend, Dottie, was wringing her paws. They were raw and pink from all the kneading, which started when she realized her partner was missing. Iota wasn’t the first mouse…

by Melanie Mulrooney Crow circled above as the sad one trudged through wet sand, scrambling to perch on the highest rock. She visited every day — huddling against the frigid wind, pleading with the ocean, leaking her salt into the vastness. Crow sang to her sometimes, when he was bored. She didn’t answer, but she also didn’t yell for him to leave. So he stayed close; they often dropped food, if he waited long enough. Receding waves carried her calls to the deep: Ty, come home. * * * One day she piled peanuts high on a rock before climbing to roost. Crow swooped in again and again to collect…

by Lynn Gazis The crows do not know me. Trapped in the wrong body now, I have no way to tell them, “I am one of you.” Once, with them, I flew and roosted, foraged and played. Together we used sticks to pry insects from holes, sledded down roofs of houses on flat circles of metal that humans had left where we could grab them, and traded information about where food could be scavenged. When we needed to, we joined forces to chase off hawks. Now the crows do not know me. When I tried to approach, to find some way to signal, hey, I’m still me, I was the…

by Alyza Taguilaso When this began, I was there in my cage lying cozy as cats are wont to do. Anticipating catnips and fish bits for the afternoon. I wasn’t the type to explore. Even if my humans let me out in the hopes of getting me to lose weight I’d only curl up in a corner and sleep some more. I like to stay where I ought to be: in safe, soft places. Sometimes there is a cage, sometimes a box. Better the comfort of thin metal and the warmth of newspaper than the cold streets where I once used to scavenge not so long ago. This story is…

by Christina Hennemann Once upon a time, a penguin lived on the vast, rugged wild west coast of Ireland. Nobody knew for sure how the penguin came to Ireland. It was a total mystery. The locals had many different theories: some said that the penguin lost its way in the endless ocean and was swept away by a massive thunderstorm. Others thought that maybe someone brought a penguin egg as a souvenir from the south pole. Some people believed that it could only be a miracle. Either way, people were very excited about the penguin, and newspapers all over Ireland wrote about it. The reporters interviewed the fishermen who had…

by Jared Povanda As the well-dressed pass him on his corner, the bard’s thorn-thick claws move like ink over the strings of his lute. “Would you like to hear the story of Queen Paloma? The story of the Righteous Few? Any story at all?” Some coins scatter his way, mirror stars beside his sooty paws, but no one stops and listens. This is a festival night, and the scent of pork fat dripping onto open fires draws the crowd as the bard’s music floats above disinterested heads. Down the narrow road, wolf children rush past with colorful streamers, though one is slower than the others. They yip to one another,…