1948 5 1
|
One of her favorites was of an old axe asleep on a desert floor. She told people the axe had the western lips of September. That it held the song of the ocean and the dreams of a scarecrow. Some thought she was mad to talk in such a way. Others believed h
|
19482010
|
A sardonic moon/
surveys our plight and cackles.
|
194832
|
The sand felt warm, the way it usually was on Saturday afternoons in Seaside Heights; face down on the beach under a hot July sun that burned my back and shoulders
|
19482118
|
When I died, she said, she was going to have me cremated and put my ashes in the cats’ litter box.
|
194820
|
Her mother told her once: "Don't be no whore, Fe-fe."
|
194742
|
I know I know how many times you want me to tell you I’m sorry, okay?
|
194764
|
When the arguing started, their voices would get louder and louder, till they broke into my dreams. That night, I woke and listened in the dark for what felt like a very long time. Perhaps I should have been afraid, but I wasn't. For one thing, they never
|
194741
|
Refuse to go to the church service, even though you already missed the funeral. Tell his mother something came up. Call his phone over and over, just to hear his voice, until his mother asks you to stop. Make a recording of his voicemail. Delete it an
|
194765
|
I peeled off a hundred. For the screwdriver, I said. The kid shook his head, made a pushing-away gesture. You need it worse’n I do right now, he said.
|
194700
|
Seven black and orange Tortoise-shell kittens nursed in a crate the day Sue returned from rehab, to her parent's Atlanta home.
|
194700
|
An armpit fart is a simulated sound of flatulence produced by creating a pocket of air between the armpit of a partially raised arm and the hand, then swiftly closing this pocket by bringing the arm close to the torso.
|
194745
|
Between the wars, I hung around in an air-conditioned room. It was tiny, and I was shoved to the back, but after living outside on another man's back for months of bullets and bombs, I welcomed the stuffiness. White paint kept close walls from reminding me of the trenches'…
|
194700
|
She turned to the window, staring into the dark. A smile crept to her lips and she laughed softly. “No, we can’t. I’m Mexican and we speak Spanish.” The smile vanished and she moved to leave. “No sé qué decir… sólo puedo llorar. Nada
|
194712
|
Phil was scared.
Not of his own shadow, but of the three men from ConAgra who'd dropped a duffel bag of green outside his den the week before.
|
1947215
|
You got a lot of people, out there
|
1946138
|
There is a price. It's on the back. If you turn it around you'll see. It isn't expensive. Everything's okay.
|
194663
|
Oh, also, had no idea what the whole visit to the Kingdom of the Dead was getting at. Interesting, but seems unrelated to the larger story. I'd cut it. Remember — this is a story about one man's attempt to get home. Stay focused on that.
|
194691
|
Stupid's rising up, I see. Melting all the intellect. I before E, except after C, but that's not how the alphabet goes.
|
194632
|
... her hair spills like spinach all the way down to her backpack, the top pocket where the bowl and the cinnamon estrange themselves from the coffee.
|
1946115
|
She wears a green and pink bikini and walks real slow, poking her chest out so people will notice her.
|
194642
|
The stern tone of the chairwoman made him miss his mother, the snap of her accusations, the sting of her belt on the backs of his legs.
|
194684
|
I want crazy at my funeral. I want clowns, a petting zoo, fireworks, craps tables, male and female strippers, and a three-person band composed of old men wearing striped vests, black pants, and straw hats: one plays a banjo, another on tuba, and…
|
194586
|
“Mules don’t like to dive, Esther.”
“I said maybe, Hugh. Maybe.”
|
194520
|
A Vicious Deer
The man came across the hall to talk to us.
He was buying some paintings.
He had a white deer on a leash.
Fosca (our Malamute) said: “That's a vicious deer.”
She kept putting her paw on its shoulder.
I said: “You bet
|
194594
|
Where I grew up, you did not venture casually into ocean waters.
|
194511
|
“They picked me up in their spaceship about noon,” Austin Grantham says to me while pulling up an apple crate to use as a stool.
|
194510
|
"People just weren't getting it," he continued, wiping his mouth on his sleeve and hiccuping mildly. "It looks like it's time to UP the ANTE!"
|
19441711
|
There were only two students in the sculpture class: an 86 year-old Jewish woman and myself.
|
19441613
|
Write a poem in which your father is a dog and you are his leash.
|
19442719
|
On the bus I sat like an ounce.
|
