Tag: fiction

Madame Tansy was a self-described witch who lived in a quiet cul de sac on the edge of town, next to a stretch of wild, untamed forest. She wasn’t the kind of witch with green skin or a crooked hat (though she did own one for Halloween). No, Tansy was a “rent-a-witch,” the kind you could book for hexes, blessings, house clearings, or an herbal sachet to keep your mother-in-law from dropping by unannounced.

She had business cards printed on pressed lavender paper that read:

Madame Tansy
Rent-a-Witch Services
“No problem too big, too small, or too weird.”
Love spells, luck charms, cursed item removal, spirit negotiations.
Inquire within. No refunds.

Her house was full of ivy, cats that came and went, jars that rattled on their own, and the smell of rosemary and old books. She had a steady stream of clients—lonely folks, skeptical teens, desperate exes, and the occasional conspiracy theorist.

One gray spring morning, a knock came at her door. She opened it to find a couple—mid-thirties, respectable in the way freshly ironed people are. The woman introduced herself as Rachel, and her husband as Tom. Their smiles didn’t match. Rachel’s was tense and too quick. Tom’s was hesitant, as if he had lost the knack for it.

“We’re here,” Rachel said carefully, “about a love spell.”

Tansy raised an eyebrow. “You want to fall in love again?”

Rachel laughed nervously. “No. We already are. Were. We just… We’ve been having problems. Fights. Distance. And we thought maybe some magic could help.”

Tom cleared his throat. “We’re not superstitious or anything. But we figured… can’t hurt, right?”

Tansy smiled a smile that had seen many such requests. “Love spells don’t make love. They stir it up, pull it forward. Sometimes that’s good. Sometimes…” She let the sentence trail into the scent of burning mugwort. “Come in.”

They sat in her cluttered parlor. Rachel held Tom’s hand tightly, as if it might disappear. Tansy mixed herbs—damiana, rose, cinnamon, vervain—into a clay bowl, murmuring words older than fences and plastic. When the ritual was complete, she gave them each a charm: tiny glass hearts with
threads of red thread wound inside.

“Sleep with these under your pillow. For three nights. Then come back.”

They left, hopeful, wary, relieved.

Three days passed. They returned. Tansy opened the door before they knocked.

“Well?” she asked.

Rachel’s eyes were red. Tom looked tired.

“We didn’t fight,” Rachel said.

“But we didn’t talk either,” Tom added.

“It’s like the spell made everything quiet. But not… fixed.”

Tansy nodded slowly. “Love’s not a potion, darlings. It’s a garden. You don’t pour glitter on dead roots and expect roses.”

Tom blinked. “So what do we do?”

Tansy motioned for them to sit again. This time she didn’t reach for herbs.
She reached for a deck of soft, worn cards. Tarot.

“Let’s see what kind of magic you really need.”

She dealt three cards. The Lovers—reversed. The Tower. The Wheel of Fortune.

“Oof,” Tansy muttered. “That’s not hearts and roses.”

“What does it mean?” Rachel asked, gripping Tom’s hand again, this time less out of love and more like a reflex.

“It means something broke,” Tansy said gently. “Or needs to. Not your marriage necessarily—but a pattern. Something between you that’s been holding everything else hostage.”

Tom looked down. “My job keeps me traveling. I’ve been gone more than I’ve been home.”

Rachel didn’t say anything, but the air tightened. Tansy leaned forward. “You want the real magic? Try this. Every night for a week, write one truth on a piece of paper. About yourself. Not each other. Something you’ve
been too afraid to say aloud.”

Rachel frowned. “That’s not really a spell.”

“Oh honey,” Tansy said with a knowing smirk, “Truth is the most dangerous magic there is. Especially between two people who want to love each other.”

They left, not smiling, but thoughtful.

Weeks passed. Tansy forgot about them in the way one forgets leaves on a river. She had other clients—one woman needed her haunted coffee table exorcised, another needed a spell to stop attracting narcissists.

Then, one sunny afternoon, she found a note slipped under her door. It read: “We did what you said. It hurt. It healed. He’s quitting his job. I’m starting my art again. We don’t need the spell anymore. But thank you for the real magic.—R & T”

Tansy smiled and tucked the note into a drawer full of similar things—thank-you notes, old photos, tiny tokens.

Because sometimes the best magic wasn’t found in cauldrons or candles.

Sometimes it was found in courage.

And truth.

And the quiet work of choosing each other again.

Every day.

Just like magic.

About Matthew Spence

Matthew Spence was born in Cleveland, Ohio. His work has most recently appeared in Gaslamp Pulp.

Website: https://www.facebook.com/WestVirginiaRebel

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‘Coffee, a Recollection’ – Diane Funston

By Auroras & Blossoms

On May 20, 2025

In The PoArtMo Corner

Coffee breaks were a daily ritual in the yellow house where I grew up. Every weekday between three and four, my grandparents and I would have our coffee, our sweets, our conversation. When I was ten years old, I was initiated into the habit of rich brown coffee and pastry afternoons. Thirty-one years later, I can still savor the memories.

My grandfather made coffee the old-fashioned way. He called it boiled coffee, pressing the almost ebony grounds through a mesh strainer into individual cups. Sometimes he used a clear glass percolator, where I could watch the pressure of the heated water force the bubbles upward, each new bubble browner and murkier than the one preceding it. We each had our special coffee cup. Grandma’s was a jade green cup with a small ring-shaped handle. Grandpa’s was the color of bone, the inside stained with the legacy of coffee breaks. Mine was a white mug trimmed in red checks, my name “Diane” across the front. It was a twin to the one my uncle had, his name “Louis” bridging the pale white spaces between the boldness of the red checks. But he was never involved in our coffee breaks. They belonged to my grandparents and me alone.

Coffee breaks were not complete without sweets. The most common was cheesecake. When resources allowed, the cut was cut fresh from under the glass dome at the Jewish bakery a few blocks away. Every week, my grandfather and I made the pilgrimage to this Jewish bakery and the German sausage shop in the same old neighborhood. The smells of the fresh wurst are forever in my memory, along with the smells of pumpernickel, rye and plump Kaiser rolls. The cheesecake was an expensive treat, sold by the pound, rich and heavy with cream cheese topped with sour cream. Substitutions were Sara Lee frozen cheesecake, French crumb cake or lady fingers. We were purists with our cheesecake, sour cream only, no fruit topping, no additives to the filling.

We were also purists with our coffee. Always fresh-made ground coffee, never anything added but evaporated milk. No one in my family ever added sugar, we took our coffee without sweetness. There is a certain art to perfect coffee, a slow stirring of enough evaporated milk to achieve a certain mellow color, which will attest to perfect flavor. Too dark a color will guarantee bitterness, too light a color will guarantee a surrender of richness of flavor.

Conversation at coffee time was warm and uncomplicated. How the seeds my grandfather and I planted we’re doing in the garden. How many tomato and pepper plants to buy at the public market next week. Whether our cat Toby would come to join us for his customary ball of liverwurst at my grandmother’s feet. There was no pressure on these afternoons. No lofty expectations, no Jeopardy-like trivia quizzes, no arguments, no distress. It was a time of pure, unspoiled childhood.

It was also a time of indulging in German culture. During coffee breaks, my grandfather was not chastised by my grandmother for speaking German, who usually denounced it at other times. During coffee breaks, my grandmother spoke German too. She crooned Christmas carols and dancing songs. My grandparents waltzed together around the yellow and green kitchen, alight with sunshine in the march of late afternoon towards evening.

The coffee breaks of my childhood were happy, peaceful times. The warmth they passed through those cups to our curled fingers held more than afternoon coffee. They held a long legacy of family togetherness, a rite of passage where I was a child and the child was treasured.

The real gold is childhood moments of innocence and harmony. Moments which link together in memory for us to wear, a locket containing how we became who we are. We sift through our days gingerly to find the treasure, whether it is in sand pouring through a toy sieve, or in the bottom of our
favorite coffee cup, grounds left over after the rolling boil.

About Diane Funston

Diane Funston has been published in journals including California Quarterly, F(r)iction, Still Points Quarterly, Penumbra, and Lake Affect Magazine. She lives in the agricultural Sacramento Valley of California with her husband and three rescue dogs. She replaced her lawn with a sustainable urban farm.

Diane was Poet-in-Residence for Yuba-Sutter Arts for two years. Her chapbook titled Over The Falls was published by Foothills Publishing in 2022.