3702 14 8
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My father failed in business in the 1950's when Dutch Elm Disease killed the elm trees in our Kansas town. He owned a fabric store on a brick street lined on both sides by elms, the doomed trees that transformed every Midwestern town into a magical kingdom and sidewalks and…
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2505 14 4
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Rendine Philips polishes his courage and enters the fray. Not virtual reality, more reality virtuous. He feels the pull and the push. Electricity pulses resistance.
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1372 14 0
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“I was just dreaming about you,” he said, sleepy-voiced. “What's for breakfast?”
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2585 14 16
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I get it. Poetry is an effort. Language is an effort. Words are an effort. Reading words is an effort. A big effort. It takes energy. Attention. Focus. Who has that? Nobody. So truly. I mean it. You don't have to read this. If you're already reading this you can…
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1706 14 12
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The hour reflected those pleasant moments when evening hunger can be satiated by anticipation alone, before the pangs become demanding.
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1569 14 8
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You always complained that Christmas/
ruined your birthday/
sister.
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128 14 9
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the only safe place for him was anywhere he and Barkley could huddle,
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964 14 15
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the making by taking away
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1607 14 12
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Behind them all, in the background, a tray of vodka tonics waits on a glass table, the limes losing color as they drown.
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1994 14 12
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I interviewed in an hour and didn’t have an umbrella, so I ducked inside the next door I passed. It didn’t matter what they sold, I wasn’t there to make a purchase.
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3798 14 6
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Do not shake the baby. Shake the martini. That’s what martinis are for.
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1343 14 9
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everything moved in circles
like the music, the booze and the drugs
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1839 14 8
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once she went to quenchthen she went to scrubnow she collects dead toadsgrinds them with cornmeal to feed her sowsonce she ploughed the land toiled with her face deep in dark soil her back burning in hot sunnow she works in the paper millmaking laminated labels for the…
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1282 14 6
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3292 14 8
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We aren't designed for darkness. Something deep inside of us, something much older and deeper than us is telling us to move away, get to warm, because if we don’t, come winter we will die.
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1821 14 14
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That was before Cohen died. Castro died. Castro Died should be a title by Samuel Beckett. Once I nearly went out to buy a bass clarinet just for the purpose of playing along with Leonard Cohen.
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1612 14 9
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I never thought I’d miss the sound of church bells, reminding me of my sudden apostasy,
faintly ringing over the rumpus where even the birds can’t get a word in edgeways.
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2753 14 8
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Just stay at home woman, and do your job /
wash those dishes, mama, its what I pays you for
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1394 14 12
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You call your wife. “Do you see what I see?” you ask.
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1795 14 11
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I'm sure someone somewhere must havefelt something like it before. Imean I've never been able tohave this kind of deep longing asif you might want to forget everythingyou know. I always figured that funny stuff onlyhappened to folks in a foreignfilm. Not to some guy…
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1681 14 11
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1924 14 6
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The winter following their son's death, Mr. Kelly's wife became absorbed by the tracks that ran in back of their house. At any given hour in the night, he'd hear her in the next room, their son's old room where she now slept, shuffling through dresser drawers. He…
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1794 14 6
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The handsome man at the opposite table swivels his head at the tall cool slim blonde entering the breakfast cafe. The ordinary woman sitting with him adjusts her chair accordingly. She pretends to ignore her husband's distraction, smoothes her hair, licks her…
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1176 14 10
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1065 14 7
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A brief colorful season/
and then the fall as winds/
break the hold the leaves have
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2072 14 3
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Tyler has a Mars bar in his jeans pocket. It’s warm and soft. He tries to insert it.
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7107 14 7
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The plumber has three lives left or else he is already dead.
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1661 14 12
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I sought to feel something. I hunted my mortality. I craved that rush of life pulsating through my veins.
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2230 14 9
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You can't always get what you want, and fortunately, that's sometimes a good thing.
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1431 14 8
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