Most discussed stories

Cold, wet and dreary.

969969 views77 comments22 favs

Cold, wet and dreary.The three words that describe Belgium. A country that owns so little identity. Sure, there are the mussels, beer, wafels and chocolate ... But that's about as far as it goes. The lack of identity rules the country, grayness rules the horizon. And…

Starlight Standup

996996 views77 comments66 favs

They wink at me as if to share/ a cosmic joke whose punch line’s still/ a couple dozen light years out

Suspended Heart

17831783 views77 comments77 favs

The suspended heart became an oracle of sorts. Hung from a string, immersed in the kind of glass container in which tulips grow, it was located between Bath and Body Works and Kleinfelter's Jewelers at the north entrance of the mall. Someone had lost it,

3 short poems (2)

14121412 views77 comments66 favs

Clear as my conscience may be, you still haunt me as the brown settles to black sit there and recommence as if nothing had ever happened, your hands conducting the orchestra of your purity.

Planet Crabby

28782878 views77 comments44 favs

On Planet Crabby a boy met a girl and a girl met a boy but neither couple got anywhere because they dismissed their prospective partner as just plain too crabby. Alternative arrangements were unthinkable. This happened a number of times.

Parts 2 Through 5 of a piece called Wilderness of Humanity, or, We Can Always Clean This Thing Up Again

14661466 views77 comments66 favs

2. humility You know what silly does? Silly guarantees that you will enjoy the moment as the moment for the moment. Clowns make fun of silly. Isn't that ironic? They are in essence the opposite of their own image. That's why so many people see them as evil--because you…

Poof

313313 views77 comments66 favs

Yesterday's protest...

The Piss-Colored Man

15811581 views77 comments55 favs

His open door was interpreted by the neighbor as an invitation to all but place a mirror under his nose. She demanded opportunities to fluff his pillows and coerced him into accepting gifts of food, more than he could possibly eat, and sometimes ate with

My Night with Sarah Palin

73267326 views77 comments33 favs

I admired her stamina. Her ability to Charlie Sheen it night after night.

Munchausen's By Sick Time

134134 views77 comments33 favs

I will never waste my sick time on my own sicknesses unless I am in a coma.

moving forward

14601460 views77 comments33 favs

see this:/ ink-stained paper/ littering miles

Whistler's Mother

11611161 views77 comments66 favs

Whistler pounded a nuanced nail, into our inferior foreheads.

Off Day

14551455 views77 comments33 favs

The world is having an off day. The sun is now lavender in color, soft on the eyes, and we stare at the new sun all day without ill effect.

Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?

672672 views77 comments66 favs

Marcel Proust had never been to a big-box store before. He was dazzled by the sheer size and scope of the store and the seeming impassivity of the shoppers. So many products, so many shelves, such strangely intriguing examples of the human condition. The people seemed…

Turtles Don't Have Hair

17911791 views77 comments33 favs

“You’ll have to do better than that,” Skip says. My husband laughs. He has a high girlish chuckle when he’s truly delighted. He can sing really high like a girl, too. “All right,” I say. I leave my headband

The Great San Francisco Poetry Wars, 19

13691369 views77 comments33 favs

His wings were down when he got into the truck. It was a used UPS truck we’d bought from someone in Berkeley, and we painted out the letter “S,” so that it just read “UP.”

Wintering at Montauk

21482148 views77 comments55 favs

Montauk was the solution. He had no job, no money. He could stay for the winter at the summer place. It would be a lark. He had come home to Great Neck after losing the last job and they were making broad hints at him to move…

Dog Horse Man

27212721 views77 comments22 favs

His appearance had never suggested health, but his body had once been fleshy, his skin pale and soft because he never went outside in the daytime.

I Beat Myself at Chess (revised)

14551455 views77 comments00 favs

There we sat, myself and I, at a small folding table in the middle of the lab beside the main, l-shaped workbench. The lab was empty - always was - except for the two of us.

Tsunami

16111611 views77 comments77 favs

Tsunamis are quiet at first: not one big wave but many small injustices, so chaotic all the pressing all the weight of the noise, like a stone holding you under.

Motel

14231423 views77 comments66 favs

Brody was standing against the wall with one hand in his hip pocket, as if he was holding a gun. The motel was set in the undergrowth of several weedy small towns, but a flashing neon sign made it impossible to miss from the road. We used it as a safe hou

Better than Chocolate

19641964 views77 comments44 favs

Teddy laughs like a machine gun. People back away when they hear him. Every time I see him at work, I try to make his skinny body rattle. I would never back away.

How To Make Potato Salad

59175917 views77 comments55 favs

Boil 8-10 red potatoes and 6 eggs in heavily salted water. Remember that the first chef you worked under taught you to salt egg-boiling water because the salt breaks down membranes between shell and meat, making the egg easier to peel later on. Decide tha

Lifetime

129129 views77 comments55 favs

"Why didn't they just elevate the drug levels and kill her off like that?"

Hobby Lobby

13141314 views77 comments66 favs

In human rights, a man and a woman may marry and bring forth a family. It is a civil right in the U.S. but not a human right (as far as I know) to raise a child singly without the knowledge of the other parent.

This Rubbery, Unsure Thing

12661266 views77 comments55 favs

The sea is transparent rubber, and peering down into it I recognize the shiny fish in suspended animation, their partially exploded bodies obscured by their own blood.

Masters

506506 views77 comments44 favs

"... he with much to teach, I who had much to learn..."

After Detox

17141714 views77 comments55 favs

When detox-man drives away, the windows down, the radio playing on the classic rock station (The Eagles), he thinks about moving out of town.

Residual Flashbacks

14911491 views77 comments66 favs

Residual flashbacks; just tiny bright lightning bolts that flash in front of my eyes, just like standing watching a soaring bonfire on a cold and frosty November night, pinprick sparks flying up into the endless darkness of the night.

Cathy

14921492 views77 comments44 favs

"Merry Christmas, Willie."