Most discussed stories

Bringing a New Poet into Your Home

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You may want to pretend to leave once or twice, peeking in through a window from a darkened room, to see how they interact. Never leave a new poet unattended with the pack until you’ve determined that the new arrival has learned to fit in with the other w

The Little Dalai Lama at Grand Central Station

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He followed me through the crowds at Grand Central Station. Wherever I went, there he was, half my height, dressed in the characteristic gold and maroon garb, with a paper cup of coffee in his hand. He must have sensed something about me. Th

Epiphany on a July Morning

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It's that day in July when you feel really bummed because you can't find your favorite white sleeveless shirt that you wear on the hottest days of the yea

You'll Never Get Anything Accomplished on an Empty Stomach

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The Star Trek marathon ends, and he flips channels. An episode of Full House is on. The cheesy plot lines and attractive women (specifically, DJ Tanner in the late seasons) have become a freakish comfort. In today's episode, the Tanners are baby sitt

The Coming of the Apocalypse

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The Operations Management Guru was visiting the twenty-fourth floor on Tuesday, and everyone at the company was wicked with fear.

The Lobbyist

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I looked down at Earth and imagined this porn star who’d asked for my help.

Sky Without a Song

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He hung up and I sang some whiney lyric about wanting him back. You know the songs that say the same shit: I’m an idiot. Love me anyway. I’m Velcro with nothing to stick to and you’re a nappy surface that gives me a reason to exist.

Point of Grace

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Say the world is a smudged charcoal drawing. Slit from its frame, smuggled out of the Vatican. Don't say it couldn't happen. Who would know.

Crazy Later

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A year ago, my neighbor was a sexy graduate student in fashion design, sounds perhaps shabby, yet if it is, then we in the Middle West are all shabby. That girl's father graduated from high school with Bob Dylan in Hibbing, not entitling her to a child.

Micro Trilogy

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I start with a morsel of truth, then hide it with lies...

Little Ditty Down

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I got caught writing poems at the paint factory several times before they fired me I got caught in the middle of one of my best lines but can’t remember what I meant to say anymore, but I know, just know it was something real good,

The Dances

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". . those incandescent secrets she would pepper in. The sister who ran away."

Unattended (novel excerpt)

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A sticky glass. An open copy of Outside magazine. A flat part of the meadow that reeked of blood and cologne. A dog (my dog) hidden in the closet, shivering so hard the hangers jangled.

Freeway Deaths Attributed to Talk Radio

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"I was just coming home from work listening to Consumer Dave," said Murrietta resident Mick Baylor, through his attorney, "when my eyelids started getting droopy. And he was just talking about how Circuit City was going out of business and I was. . .well,

Brock & Cheryl: Comp

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This Tippy’s name was Cheryl — something both of them were so far not committing to paper or saying. Unusual in a salesman, she thought. He is insincere and intends to sell her something.

Shades

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It was the sodabottle glasses that scared Entro the most. Stubbled with scratches, taped with residual angst and piercing his soul with contempt he’d seen only on the National Geographic Focus Antarctica series - as Seals readied to mangle for Alpha bragg

The Conversation Killer

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I stand corrected once more.

Blueberries

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Cold water shocked Ernest's face. The evening with Gracie had his nerves hot and popping. She was his fifth date and the closest to his memory of Sadie in college so far. He looked up at himself in the bathroom mirror with his mouth agape. Redness flooded…

The Wedding

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Anneliese inserted one of her crystal drops in Hymen's left ear and kept her left earring in. For a quarter, she bought a handful of cashews and plopped them on a red napkin.

Hope's Amanuensis

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I was low on carburetor / oxygen and my fraud protection / had just expired.

Art Survives

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Forget the salt erasure of Carthage,/ all the Meso-American artifacts/ smelted to float the Armada

Jagged Dog Story

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But I had learned from ingesting Roberto’s glitter-eyed fear, it could make you never close enough, and then, never far enough away. And both at the same time.

Dishwater Panacea

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Suds, like gossamer bandages at her wrists, concealed the turbulence below but could not relieve it.

A Little Load of Paint

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Cézanne sags during a moment of paint. There is an umbrella in the room whose surface collects his thoughts. Outside, in the rain, the grass and garden smell strongly of spring. Fruit litters the table. Light through the window writhes in conversation with shape and…

13 imaginary friends

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1. He had thirteen imaginary friends. They knew him better than his mother did.2. His imaginary friends were all born of a cat on the night of a blood moon.3. His imaginary friends had grey skin and red eyes, giving them the appearance of dead people. Their cheeks flushed…

Breaking Point

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I can do the hot coals, no problem. Or, your love, eyes closed. Or your sneer, spank, suffering, resentment, rejection.

The TV

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The absence sits on the window sillIt looks like the tree growing in front of itlimbs long and crookedwretched clocktime passes like torn silkShe sits at the mirror looking past thingsHer TV blasts the newsconfront the questionCovid -19 The vaccinationTrump is…

Sestina McRib

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And now the McRib is back. Two dollars.

My Name is Smegma Jones, and I'm a Pussy: A Memoir

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[JESUS LOVES YOU MORE THAN ANYBODY, BUT HE'S DEAD. NO-ONE COULD EVER LOVE YOU AS MUCH, OR YOU THEM, SO DON'T EVEN TRY. HAVE A NICE LIFE! MERRY CHRISTMAS, EVERYONE!]

You Can Push Things

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to the back of your mind like a box of unpacked yet beloved books if you want, but that's no life I want to explore any further with you. We don't have as much time as we once thought, to believe in something other than empty bottles lost in the…