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3 Poems Of Broken Hands And Lonely Drones

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another lonely drone holding still

Apple

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Madeleines, which he hadn’t touched in twelve years, had a place in all this, were accessories in his daughter’s violation.

Walking To Gibraltar, Chapter 4: In Which A Long Walk Is Considered

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The summer before cancer—the summer of the boy/friend, the summer before Max started high school, the summer when all the decisions about blowing apart their marriage were made—they drove to Martha's Vineyard. Astrid had insisted she wasn't going, rig

Shoelace

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A shoelace should know its place in the world.

A Conversation With a Ghost

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This must never get out in the press, for it would cause widespread panic. The priests would surround my house, not to mention the police and possibly the army. Castor Desayuno has come back from the dead!

All of My Facebook Friends Are Gonna Be Strangers

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I once knew a guy named Ian from Manhattan Who liked looking at New Yorker fey cartoons.

Weeks

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She was wearing a black tank top and jeans, standing in the shade. Why was she there again? The camera hanging around her wrist answered her question. Right, he had called. He had asked if she could take picture for him and his…

Dear Mei

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I planned and planned. I followed the veterinarians around and I took vials of panda tranquilizers when they were not looking, and it was often that they forgot to look. The earth kept shaking, they were hungry, and many did not know what had become of th

Mexican Audio

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Chromio citrio sticky-floored furio...

The Runt of the Litter

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Little Dave, I thought--what's he doin' drinking coffee? Then I figured out he must have been 18 if I was twenty. He could drink coffee if he wanted.

The $64,000 Question

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One day over a hardscrabble dinner of gristly beef and lumpy mashed potatoes, his uncle looked up at him and said, “Kee-rist, boy, school’s gonna start any day now. And winter ain’t far behind. I can’t keep you here. We gotta figure out something for you.

All Of My Monsters And Beautiful Women In Dreams

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1. Lamia I slapped the venomous dream from his mouth before he could spit in my eyes; fuck him and his rage, fucking Tonton Macoute or whatever he was--and I got the hell out and away from that house and the fires that raged on all floors, and I fled…

Beyond Penderecki

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From a window, the young Pole Krzysztof Penderecki saw resistance fighters hanged by Nazis...

Let's All Go Down to the Rising River

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As the pastor of a small southern church, I'm often asked by our younger members about this prickly notion of global warming. They herd around me, as adolescents are prone to do, and they ask me, “Dear father, is this something that we should fear, these…

My Old Man, Across a Hotel Pool in the Bahamas

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Three guys playing “Cocoanut water, rum and gin” on steel drums, guitar and trap set outside on the deck by the pool.

Possum

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A possum sits on a fence. The fence is downtown in a not-very-big town. Hard to say about possums and fences; this is not the first possum to sit on a fence. Once, during a suburban backyard party a possum sat on a fence and observed. Before long he could walk more…

Steel and Spell

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Pen or sword? Pick one/choose your battles carefully/for the paths oppose

Meteor Shower

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A rain of stones . . .

Knell Quarternion

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The Jester sat down on the edge of his mattress. He laboured to bring one gout ridden leg up to lay across the other. The jingle bell at the tip of his pointed toe mocked each serrated movement of his limb with a jaunty tinkle. He grabbed his ankle to arrest its…

I Am Wearing Stolen Socks

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I am wearing stolen socks. Not because I haven't any of my own, and not because they are an exact fit. Only because they soothe my emptiness inside.

Going Along for the Ride

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You could hear her coming from a long way off like she kept trying to catch her breath, like she was getting the fun rattled out of her bones. But it was laughter, always laughter that kept on filling up her belly from the inside and she was

DIVINE EROS

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I drink the funeral in a dream. I give satisfaction in voice overs.

The Fourth Prague Defenestration: 4

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“So, vot you think?” Vladimir asked us. “You want to come see these paintings? This is once in lifetime chance. Not many left who know about these. And I know where they are.” All the while he kept looking around to make sure nobody was eavesdroppin

The Fourth Prague Defenestration: 18

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I went back to the Charles Bridge over the Vltava River and felt the plaque of the Wall of Gropers, and that was where we hatched our plan, in front of my ancestors. I could just feel their presence there. They would be with me, the Gropers of Prague.

The Treehouse

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I noticed Sean changed after his grounding. We no longer played night soldiers around the block, no longer biked to the creek to catch crayfish he'd crush with his boots. Sean stopped hunting lizards, stopped charging smaller kids toll to pass…

My Darling Dead Ones

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Do you remember?

Calm and Level

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The funeral grounds look level and calm. We leave the urban world behind for an instant. The other world has claimed someone. But we are in limbo. It is a terrible thing when a connection or breakthrough moment is not achieved or granted by the universe. …

Boss Gloss

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Short-short fiction

If we left Cuba, we can leave anything.

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The chivatos called us gusanosbecause we left with largegreen duffle bags filled withonly personal belongings.They were chivatos becausethey followed Fidel and likegoats ran at the mouth wheneversomeone was not loyal to the new regime.Gusanos they saidwere…

Record of a Living Being

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Kurosawa was silent as we traipsed through the destruction, carefully side-stepping piles of sodden pages and heaps of swollen, broken-backed texts. Workers in coveralls used wide brooms to push water toward a floor-drain at the back of the store.