Zeno’s days usually began just before sunrise. Soon after waking, he would descend to the streets, which were still quiet at this hour. He would walk leisurely to his school, watching the city gradually unfold under the cool purple, blue, then golden hues of the...

You may not know it, but there is a rabbit who lives and works on the Moon. His occupation? He spends all his days making pure, white rice cakes. In the evenings, he lays them out carefully, with each rice cake distanced equally from the others, until the entire...

There was an old farmer who had a herd of horses. One day, the horses broke through the fence and the whole herd ran off into the wild.    On hearing the unfortunate news, the old farmer’s neighbor came over and said, ‘This is really bad fortune for you.’ The old...

A cook was butchering an ox for his employer. Every slide of his wrist, every circle of his elbow, every push of his shoulders, every pivot on his toes and heels, and every gliding movement of the knife were in perfect harmony—like the sections of a royal orchestra. ...

One day, a grandfather and his granddaughter were preparing dinner.  The grandfather says to his granddaughter, ‘I have two wolves in my heart that are fighting each other. One wolf is vengeful, angry, and afraid, while the other wolf is kind, forgiving, and loving.’ ...

There was a man so displeased by the sight of his own shadow and the sound of his own footsteps that he was determined to get rid of both by running away from them.    But every time he put his foot down, there was another step, and his shadow kept up with him...

Once upon a time, there were two boys who lived on a quiet island. They would spend the bulk of their days repairing fishing weirs and lobster traps. They lived just two houses down from the island’s lighthouse, where the land stretched high above the sea to form...

A young lion was taken into captivity and thrown into a concentration camp where, to his amazement, he found other lions who had been there all their lives, for they had been born in captivity. No one could even remember a lion who had never been born there. The...

The air was beginning to tighten—only the white cloud of exhalation broke the dryness of the crisp winter air. The rising condensation was moonlit and heavy as it left Jiro’s mouth. His breath was dense and not the only thing slowly dissipating upwards, as Jiro...