Most discussed stories

Epilogue as Prologue

248248 views22 comments33 favs

.

The Celebrity

18091809 views22 comments00 favs

I love reading about myself. There's nothing more gratifying than seeing my name in the paper, knowing so many people are interested in who I am and what I do.

A Selection From Einstein's Letters

20562056 views22 comments11 fav

My dear Papa: I don't care to join you on holiday. Last summer when I came you and Frau Himmelfarb played "Wildlife Management" so late into the night that I got no rest.

wanna ball?

973973 views22 comments11 fav

There was still another, in 1971. That would have been this girl who had been a student of mine at that little Midwest college (her name escapes me right now.) She came out to Laguna Beach one time when I was already living up in Santa Cruz, and we saw

The Blue Whale

18481848 views22 comments22 favs

The blue whale in the bathtub weighed one hundred tons and wore a grin like the Cheshire cat on steroids. Her smile stretched from wall to wall. Her blowhole scraped the ceiling. Sam never learned how she crammed her tail down into the drainpipe,…

Consolation

190190 views22 comments22 favs

I didn't have the words. Something about how he looked in that moment: elderly and frail, a tiny square speck of shaving cream I'd just noticed on his jawline, and his mouth set in the same soft shape of hurt that I'd seen it in years ago---the best I co

The Last Words of a Genius

27882788 views22 comments11 fav

The crowd gathered around the dying man's bed, waiting for his last words. He was a genius. The most prolific writer and philosopher to ever live. He wiped his ass with the words of Shakespeare. The thoughts of Plato, Socrates, Descartes, and Nietzsche w

Dream Eater

17101710 views22 comments22 favs

I began to feed him. All the things I could think of - horror movies, cheese, salt, pickles, chilli. Vitamin B6 tablets washed down with warm milk. Anything I could do to grow little nightmares for my new pet.

Blind Observer.

16981698 views22 comments22 favs

I sat there, observing the city people. Frowns upon all our faces. The rain moistened my heart and journal. A blind family; a trio. They used their wands to lead the way.Their faces read joy but, most importantly, satisfaction.My envy filled the damp page.

A Tangled Web of Likes

13951395 views22 comments00 favs

Liking up with the Joneses...

Mail

191191 views22 comments11 fav

he strides with noble purposefulness along the crazy paving

The Night

15341534 views22 comments00 favs

Meanwhile stars continue to surprise...

Inbox (1)

15951595 views22 comments33 favs

The email landed in his inbox.He'd been staring at the empty screen for a while now even though, really, he hadn't been expecting anything to arrive, yet there it was.He sat and stared, not daring to click it. He knew he shouldn't have sent a mail in the first place. He…

Dating My Terrorist

14011401 views22 comments11 fav

“Maybe you should consider dating your terrorist,” my dad said to me. “Most terrorists, I think their problem is they can’t get a date. "

The Stranger I : Vic's

16111611 views22 comments00 favs

The location : Vic's Seedy Space Bar. No, that's not just a description, that's the real name.

Working things out in my head

16321632 views22 comments00 favs

A shot in the dark and everything goes black. It's as if the story never happened.

Amma

10391039 views22 comments00 favs

God love him, she used to say. you never noticed it much at the time because it is just something like a habit. a benevolent habit. around through the years and decades she went like that. God love him, she used to say, if she saw someone resting peacefully, of if…

don't let the flames chase you away

16121612 views22 comments11 fav

my maddening pyromaniac,/ you're burning up my heart/ so open up your broad-toothed mouth/ and let me pour the ashes in.

Mistrial

10051005 views22 comments00 favs

His tie was made in France. Shoes: Italian. White, broadcloth shirt —Brooks Brothers, I'm guessing from the way the collar stood at attention under his medical jacket. He looked professional, but for a doctor, his attire, like the social worker with him,…

A Rare Meteor Shower

13061306 views22 comments33 favs

Now, as we sat on lawn chairs / on the balcony to watch the meteor shower

It Seems You've Stumbled Upon My Bildungsroman

16161616 views22 comments22 favs

Why yes I began writing this, my bildungsroman, Who is Mitsy Jackson, in spring, 1974 or thereabouts, and thank you so much for asking.

Pitch Meeting

14151415 views22 comments22 favs

Someone shoved over a table. A little girl started crying.

The Light Of the Face

10941094 views22 comments22 favs

We all have our place But it’s always there, isn’t it Streaming throughout our lives The light of the face Where most of the soul comes to rest We see it best when the hard wind blows Cause in the course of events The wind will know our

Superman and the Best Vacuum Cleaner Salesman in New York City

11211121 views22 comments00 favs

I remember driving to New York City the summer of 1964, just before I met you. That was the very first time I ever smoked a joint. In those days it was happy dope. We got high and everything seemed so funny! Those were the days! I drove into the city

fish gut buckets

15851585 views22 comments00 favs

The pier stretched out by where sharks came and men waited with beautiful dirty buckets that held strange and dangerous things, buckets with fish guts, buckets with blood, with character, buckets like prophets or a gritty desert walking saviour like Chris

One for the Ages

896896 views22 comments11 fav

It was 1984, that foreboding year, I now recall. You were in the hospital, your cat having snagged your nail.

Dialysis

12661266 views22 comments22 favs

On the days I wasn’t there, my insides felt like paper-mâché.

It's End of the World Karaoke

15731573 views22 comments22 favs

It’s End of the World Karaoke at Big Daddy’s and Lara takes a photo of herself for Facebook before she goes on stage. She’s holding a basket of nachos in one hand and her phone in the other. After she takes the photo, she says, to Javier, “Hold these,” an

GRIDLOCK

3131 views22 comments11 fav

North of Los Angeles - 210 FreewayWhen Central Dispatch's Gate bot mistakenly set Mongo down in the middle of present day rush hour instead of his cave home in prehistoric Rudy Valley, traffic was, as usual, gridlocked in all directions; a woman in an SUV was on her cell…

Dusk

15641564 views22 comments22 favs

Her memory was a faded pastiche of the past, and indeed the present sat uneasily in the middle of the dreams that governed her mind; so it was that often she would forget the day, the time, the year.