Most discussed stories

A Language in Decay or the Progress of a New World Vernacular

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All poets that end their poems with words like cancer should be hungSingers sweetly croonAbout the blood of the lambNail pierced handsThorny crownAnd 39 bloody stripes. …

Farewell Letter to the Blues

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And, you peasy-headed shrew, don’t you dare think I didn’t notice that it was you who stuck that fork into my neck in the Piggly Wiggly parking lot late Tuesday night . . .

Sushi's Night Out

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... she’d stolen her boyfriend away from her, leaving her with a goldfish and a cat. Oh, and a pillow and some lights, she added. And I can’t really see you, because I’m blind.

Finite

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This was not a good sign, comforting gestures from strangers were bad omens.

The Nude Pianist: A Novel: Chapter 8

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—So much for a cocktail at the tender hour of twilight, he told the empty beer bottle.

Knowing

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I come here, to this very spot for a reason. Imagine — the illusion of knowing what is and is not. The contentment drops taste — one could suppose — like that.

how to find the gold-capped ocean

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I didn’t know how to find the gold-capped ocean. How was I supposed to know where it was? I only knew you did not want or expect me to follow you there, where the orifice to everything withers, including my heart. Openings from the rivers drying in the

Potsdamer Strasse

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She stared unbreakingly, confident, knowing; and talked so close to my face I felt cornered. But her voice was something, low and smooth.

Still

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I wanted only to be still, to become a rustle for a moment of papery fall leaves sighing past one another on their way to the funeral pyre in the front lawn, sweetly fragrant with the scent of death and inevitable decline, fearless in their annihilation, incandescent…

Poetry Hour at the Regional House of Pancakes

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The waitress appears and Fred gives her a big smile and th3 once over. It's no wonder he's had so many women in his life while I've . . . uh . . . read a lot of books.

stye

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poked in the eye

The Book of Punishments

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"Not a fan?" Beth asks, feeling a sliver of happiness move through her. He furrows his brow. "Then what brings you here?" "I'm here to pick up girls," Steve says simply. "Want to hit the buffet table? Want to run away to Mexico?"

Sorry, Sunflowers

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I've eaten all the sunflowers, spit the husks of their pupils onto the flood plain and cut away their stem-stalks. Now nobody can behold the sun. A feeble manx is trying to retrieve the cookies she dropped in the bubble bath tub. Snicker- doodles or…

Upon A Time

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What we did was walk in on an amazing starfish convention, everyone lazing about, softly frozen against the timeless drooling currents like strange looking wind socks washing up and down with the sun. I am empty, hear me roar in blubbery bluster and…

Snowflake 632565000012

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YES, YES, Dismiss.

Gravity

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It's only been about three minutes. We're moving a bit faster now and many of those around me have already been taken out by the debris. One guy had his head smashed in by a rogue swing set that came out of nowhere. I envy his demise, at least a little…

RUSSIAN ROULETTE

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“What the hell was that? Is that your take on The Deer Hunter?”

Blind

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a dim wood-paneled stair leading to the ladies’ rooms, candle-lit.

The Human Car Wash of Self-Esteem

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It was one of those dinner parties where everyone had had a little too much to drink, and the conversation around the table had grown more . . . shall we say, spirited.

For Dejan S. & Bob V. & Gordy B.

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Put blisters on your fingers and Put plasters on your head but Put peppers on your privates and You’ll wish that you were dead!

Rocky 4

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Rocky looked iron-built, tall and lean, not round like April. Russian lawn ornament, I said, mistaking the thought as mine.

A Butterfly For A Married Woman

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A married woman requests a butterfly tattoo that won't please her husband from an old tattoo artist.

End of an Astronomer

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Dead End

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I unwrap my #4, the greasy smell wafting over my nostrils, and I pause, with the understanding that this will be the highlight of my day, and that I should savor the moment, and then I bite in.

Poem in A Dead Language Only I Understand, Translated for You

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I used to be a poet, you know. / Better, in many respects, than you.

Pavane

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The shadows hang fast on the downs this day: And I hang like the darkness, over heath and down; Since the air there is clearer than the clouds, men say, And I'm lost in the country, I shall turn to town. If the heather is restless, then the fete is …

Giant Piece of Art Causes Chaos in Switzerland

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Flying Piece of Art Causes Chaos in Switzerland (from news article, with some additions) A giant inflatable dog turd by an American artist blew away from an exhibition in the garden of a Swiss Museum, bringing down a power line and breaking a gree

Bands I Have Known

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Flu Fighters Hood Ornament Good Hydration Jacques Strappe Tar and Feathers Bad Oyster Band Mysterian and the Skid Marks Nimble Candle and the Streakers Uniball and the Supporters The Skinny Rubber Band

Edward Ogle the Fifth

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Roaming beetles knitting needles chopstick counter attack.

last attempt at innocence

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When we were leaving to go to the ice rink, Lynda surprised all of us by saying she wanted to come along. She slid all the way over in the front seat to be next to me, while one of my buddies, Miller, who had his eye on her himself, slid into the passen