Happy Valentine’s Day. For some this is a day of love poetry and candied hearts, for others it is a day of willfully ignoring the former. Regardless of your state, I want to share two books with you:

image
Hint Fiction: An anthology of stories in 25 words or fewer
Edited by Robert Swartwood
(Published by WW Norton)

image
Glimpse: Selected Aphorisms
by George Murray
(Published by ECW Press)

Both slim volumes are big on the poetry of brevity. And in honour of Saint Valentine, I have plucked some love stories for you.

Hint Fiction: Edited by Robert Swartwood

Rapunzel by James Burt
The boys waited below the tower-block for the paper planes. They fought over them, to be the one to carry them back to her.

Ideal by Ha Jin
The boy dreams of becoming a panda who makes money by meeting visitors. For such a pampered celebrity, even a girlfriend is provided.

The Time Before the Last by Marcus Sakey
He held her crepe-paper hand and summoned an autumn day, sepia and smoke, and dancing, and music that sounded nothing like the beeping of machines.

Glimpse: Selected Aphorisms by George Murray

Writing the erotic poem is like ironing in the nude, sexy for women, dangerous for men.

She looks like a million bucks, but it’s all in fives.

In martyrs and poets both, the rumour of greatness is enough to starve off criticism.