PAUL A. TOTH lives in Michigan. His fiction has been nominated for a Pushcart prize and Best American Mystery Stories. Credits include Exquisite Corpse, The Barcelona Review and Drunken Boat. His novel Fizz will be published in late 2003. A short film based on Fizz has been directed by special effects wiz John Tissavary (The Matrix) and will be released soon (for more info, see Paul's site: www.netpt.tv). He is an Assistant Fiction Editor at Small Spiral Notebook.

                                                    general tso's chicken


You snore loudly. Try not to wake yourself. All who ask receive the answer in this form, as I am limited in death.

I am General Tso. I was born in 1812 and participated in The Taiping Rebellion, the Nien Rebellion, the Muslim Rebellion and the conquest of the Sinkiangs. I guided my forces while sick with malaria and dysentery.

Think of this next time you eat General Tso's Chicken: I fought on fields wet with dew and blood. In dawn's glare I saw the ghosts of battles past and future. I did not see a small white box containing vegetables and chicken in a sweet/spicy sauce.

I must leave. Your body makes a perfect form while sleeping and rapid eye movements make poets even of Americans. I lay my glove on your forehead to press upon you this thought: Next time you realize it has been a while since you've ordered General Tso's Chicken, let the thought pass away into the mist of history.

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© 2003 Paul A. Toth