Frogs
(& other amphibians)
micro series
poetry
Tadpole Poem
Sean Cho A. is a writer living in the southern united states.
Dead Rivers
Wasima Khan is a Pakistani-Dutch writer, poet, and jurist from The Hague. She is the winner of the 2025 Willow Springs Surrealist Poetry Prize and the 2026 Blue Frog Flash Fiction Prize. Her work has appeared in About Place Journal, Fourteen Hills, Redivider, phoebe, and elsewhere. Find her at: www.wasimakhan.com
fiction
How Toad Sued Heaven and Won
a retelling of a Vietnamese folk tale
It was a year of heavy drought. Toad decided to visit and sue Heaven. He was joined by Bear, Crab, Rooster, Dog, Tiger, and Bee. At Heaven’s gate, Toad asked his friends to hide and wait, then sounded the drum three times.
Heaven, busy playing chess, told Thunder to check who it was at the gate. Upon hearing it was an ugly Toad, he got mad and sent the Centipedes to fight him, but they were swiftly defeated by Rooster. Fox was sent to fight Rooster and lost to Bear and Dog. Even Thunder was attacked by Bee and Crab, and ran away when he saw Tiger.
Heaven had to give Toad a hearing. He then asked Dragon to bring rain on Earth, and promised that from now on it would rain whenever Toad croaked for him.
Khuê Thi is a Saigon-based translator and writer with a keen interest in studying and translating Vietnamese literature. She holds an MA in Literary Translation from the University of East Anglia. She has read the entire collection of the Treasury of Vietnamese Folk Tales in its original language as well as Vietnamese translations of Andersen’s and Grimms’ fairy tales and Greek mythologies. Her favorite American comic book series is Fables.
Sapo de Oro
Rogelito hadn't missed the sapo's mouth since he was seven, tossing coins into the brass frog's mouth while his parents worked the taps. Now an oxygen tank hissed where his father used to stand, and the tournament pot could keep the bank from the door.
The frog had asked for one kiss. Rogelito had laughed.
First toss: the brass mouth clicked shut. Second, third — shut, shut. Around him, strangers' coins dropped in easy as rain. When he gathered his rejected centavos, the frog winked.
Nine tosses left. He thought of his father counting the register with shaking hands. Then he bent fast, before shame could catch him, and pressed his lips to the brass — cold, tasting of every coin it had ever swallowed.
The mouth yawned wide. Every toss after rang like a bell.
The frog smiled, counting the minutes until midnight, contemplating Rogelito's reaction.
Frank Brinker is a Peruvian-American writer based in Michigan. His fiction has appeared in Mouthful of Salt and Dualiterary Magazine. He grew up watching the elders of the Peruvian Club of Michigan pitch coins at the golden frog of Sapo, waiting for his turn. The club disbanded before he had a chance to, but the memories remain of his found family enjoying Peruvian traditions together.
The Jealous Old God Sets a Plague of Frogs Upon the Land
When the Old God saw that his hold on the people was slipping and the ancient stories had faded from memory, he sent a plague of frogs as punishment. The creatures climbed up out of the rivers and lakes and canals by the thousands, until their croaks rolled across the land like thunder.
“When the people see their fields roiling with the churn of frogs, they will remember and fear me once more,” he said.
The Old God looked on with anticipation as a young maiden stepped out of her home into a street overrun by frogs. She picked one up and clutched it to her chest.
“How kind and generous our God is,” she exclaimed. “For he has sent these frogs to eat the insects that spoil our crops, and we will have a plentiful harvest. We will worship him, for he has not abandoned us after all.”
Janel Comeau is a writer, illustrator, comedian and youth worker based in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. Her work has been nominated for Best Small Fictions, and has appeared in Haven Spec Magazine, Write or Die Magazine, Ink in Thirds, NUNUM, Paranoid Tree Press, HAD, and several other fine publications and anthologies. She is a writer and editor for "The Beaverton", Canada's top source of satire news.
On my first date with Sebastian from Stardew Valley
He was a perfect 16-bit gentleman: he held the door for me and walked into—I mean pushed in—my chair.
He was embarrassed by his bedroom basement, so we went for a walk after dinner, where he repeated his four lines of dating dialogue—mostly comments about how his hatred for this town had dissipated since I moved in.
He tried to hold my hand, but I didn’t have the PDA DLC, so we had to pretend that our pixelated palms were touching, that our 0’s had turned to 1’s; our heat, to hearts.
When it started raining, he walked me back to my farm and waited until I had unlocked the door before he left—but not before telling me that if I was lucky, I might see a frog in this kind of weather.
Kristin Gustafson has played over 1,000 hours in Stardew Valley and almost always marries Sebastian. She was one of Literary Cleveland’s 2023-2024 Breakthrough Writing Residents and is currently working on her first chapbook about screen addiction. Her work has appeared in The Offing, HAD, The Quarter(ly), BULLSHIT LIT, fifth wheel press, and a bunch of other cool places. She hopes that you see a frog today.