The City Inside a Pencil

Max keeps a yellow pencil behind his ear and spends a sunny afternoon sharpening it at his desk. A tiny squeak leads him to a surprising discovery: within the pencil lives a whole city, no bigger than his thumb, where miners in yellow hard hats and builders in green aprons carry out their daily work. When the sharpener turns again, a voice begs him to stop, and a miner named Pip explains that each turn trims away streets and homes, pushing the buildings toward a cliff of wood shavings.

Max halts immediately and offers his help. Pip brings him to Willow, a builder with braided chestnut hair, who says the city needs a new home safe from sharpening. Searching his desk, Max finds an empty pencil case with a soft cloth lining, and the tiny residents agree it suits them. The miners and builders gather their tools, climb onto Max's hand, and are carried inside one by one, where a bottle cap becomes a town square, a matchbox a library, and woven thread makes the carpets. This gentle tale by Yavuz DEMİRKIRAN can be read on Online Masal.