Humble thank you to Pictura Journal for nominating my short story Sempty Inches for the prestigious Best Small Fiction 2026 anthology.

“He always wears a tie, and never mind if the shirt has a collar. In winter, two ties encircle his neck, the knots like fraternal twins, huddled close in the gaunt hollow of his neck . . . Unhoused and often unwashed he might be, but never will his ties be askew.”
3-minute read

The story began eight years ago as an exercise in writing without cliches. It sat in WIP limbo all that time. Many thanks to the wonderful editors at Pictura Journal for including it in their beautiful August 2025 issue, and for their insightful interview with me as well.

Best Small Fictions  is the first contemporary anthology solely dedicated to anthologizing the best internationally published short hybrid fiction in a given calendar year. Now in its eleventh year of existence, Best Small Fictions features the best microfiction, flash fiction, haibun stories, and prose poetry from around the world.