Who Likes Short-Shorts?

I'm very fond of short stories. I like to read them, and when I'm feeling confident, write them as well. But there's real fun in writing limited-length short stories, which are referred to as short short stories. Or, if they're very short, they're sometimes called short short short stories. Arguably one of the best short short stories is Appointment in Samarra:

"A merchant in Baghdad sent his servant to the market. The servant returned, trembling and frightened. The servant told the merchant, 'I was jostled in the market, turned around, and saw Death.

'Death made a threatening gesture, and I fled in terror. May I please borrow your horse? I can leave Baghdad and ride to Samarra, where Death will not find me.'

The master lent his horse to the servant, who rode away, to Samarra.

Later the merchant went to the market, and saw Death in the crowd. 'Why did you threaten my servant?' He asked.

Death replied,'I did not threaten your servant. It was merely that I was surprised to see him here in Baghdad, for I have an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.'"

A bookstore whose newsletter I subscribe to recently sent me a list of 6-word-long short shorts published by Wired.com for some Sci-Fi contest. One complaint I've heard is that many are actually more like headlines or titles than stories. But there are some gems:

Longed for him. Got him. Shit.
- Margaret Atwood

Weeping, Bush misheard Cheney’s deathbed advice.
- Gregory Maguire

Leia: "Baby's yours." Luke: "Bad news…"
- Steven Meretzky

The best of the six-word short shorts -- the one that inspired all the rest -- comes from the man who only wrote a single, one-act play in his entire life (which my friends and I performed while under the influence, some years ago), the man who took it upon himself to go U-Boat hunting off the Gulf of Mexico in a fishing craft during WWII, the man whose arguably best short story is being eradicated by global warming, Ernest Hemingway, wrote this:

"For sale: baby shoes, never worn."

Isn't that sumthin?

The reason I bring it up is I was looking for material I'd written creatively to show potential employers when I ran across a 64-word short-short I wrote for my own "Get a Life" writer's club, which has since gone defunct, been reborn, gone defunct again, and been reborn again, albeit with only a few remaining writers left to participate. These ones came from a title prompt of "The eyes have it":

Stella led her guests into the gloomy library. Shelves held jars of preserves, reminders of her husband’s glory days.
“Exquisite!” a vampire exclaimed, lifting a jar containing two withered hands.
“Yes,” Stella mused, “my husband was quite the… collector.”
“What is your favorite of Dr. Frankenstein’s collection?” another asked.
“Most people like the brains, but as for me,” she paused, “the eyes have it.”

--Angela Erwin


That sound. It hits my stomach before it hits my ears. It doesn’t register for a few minutes. But when I see the bright blood seeping into the asphalt, I know. Who could do something like that? Throw a kid into oncoming traffic. I look around for the answer, my gaze resting on two black orbs, and I find it. The eyes have it.

--Christine Gordon


The eyes have it — that heart-wrenching, pleading look. Twenty-three folk from outside town whose homes had washed away with the flood stood against the wall. Mayor Phelps had the deciding vote. Annex the community and help them rebuild? The cost might break the back of his tiny town. He stared long and hard into those eyes — then raised his hand. “The ayes have it.”

--David Leone

Fell free to deposit a 6-word or 64-word short short on the comments page.