Most read stories

Silent Summer

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It's eerie. There are no birds. My friend and I take our morning walk in a bubble of silence.

How I Made My Fortune

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At the time I first went to work for Mr. Byron my family was in a sorrowful state. My dad, much as I can recall, was one of those roving kinds, called himself a carpenter or contractor, depending on the kind of job he was aspiring to, and was subject to f

NAN : A Novel-In-Stories

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My novel-in-stories, NAN, is now available as an ebook for $6.99. Thanks to everyone who read the first 7 published stories here on Fictionaut.

Epitaph N+1

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We die in order to get some rest

Listen To Our Birds

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We know a poem isn't going to stop you From invading our town. It won't get you to Listen to our birds any more than to our Sunsets. That's not why we do it. We know A poem isn't going to break the blade of Your knife like an…

Quiet (from Grand Street literary journal)

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I know it’s nobody’s fault, and that one thing had nothing to do with the other, because it was this way for me since I was born; they just didn’t figure it out for a while that with one of my ears I could hardly hear, and with the other, I couldn

American Triptych

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It’s always fun and easy/ to punish the poor

Squishy

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Martin named it “Squishy” for two reasons. The first reason was because it was the noise it made when it came out of the hole in his basement. The second is because it’s what it did to Grandfather...

A Country of Husbands

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The first husband was young and lovely. He had a little nose and long fingers he used for things like planting begonias in my clay pot. I did not do flowers. So that was nice.

Headstone III

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My only brother. Frantic flesh clings to bone.

The Misanthrope Confesses

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I murdered my inner child/ at 7 and neither denied/ nor confessed the act until now.

july 23

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I get that drunk feeling right before it starts to rain. The sky is dark and heavy and the clouds break open with a flash and suddenly there is water running down all of the windows like one million pairs of eyes crying hard. The street is suddenly …

13 Halloweens

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1. The Walking Heart Attack Man has two outfits. In the summer he dresses in a short sleeve checkered button down shirt and high waisted Bermuda shorts with sandals. In the winter he wears dark pants and loafers with a gray corduroy coat…

Thick Rib of the Lamentation Animal

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This violin of oneself, this rough strum of I, arc of wing over thick rib. This masturbatory chirping like the meat of God clenched in your teeth, an apostrophe giving aloneness possession over the inarticulate, a bridge between chords.

If It Isn't One Thing, It's Another

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My friend says there's some kind of bug that bites its mate's head off after they have sex.

Hard To Know You Can't Go Back

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The light against the nylon walls of the tent gets me feeling a little down. The air's wet inside, but it's warm. The whole world outside is creaking and chirping, everything that wakes up with the dawn's first tepid blue light does so and starts making n

Prompts

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Write a poem in which your father is a dog and you are his leash.

Cripple

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"I know," Timothy explained, "he can't use it. He's a cripple." No one else seemed to understand.

Men Respond to Women's Tennis Grunts With Armpit Farts

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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.

Worry

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I turned on the television last night, and one of the networks had a segment about a girl with no nose.

The 2nd poem.

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You came to me In the self made calm Causing quite a storm You want me to rejoice and relax? Not knowing my fears Shall we ever fly?

Diptych for Saint Gertrude of Nivelles, Protectoress Against Mice, Rats, and Mental Illness

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So she set about eliminating the problem, all the time recalling some newsmagazine program she’d seen as a child: a discussion of hantavirus, nasty and deadly and spread by mice.

Drunk Sonnet (for Meg Tuite)

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perjured like a fickle impulse

The First Soliloquy of the Interior Zombie

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But do come close enough for me to hear.

Toward a Critique of Everything Existing

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You got a lot of people, out there

Waiting to Disappear

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Phew! That was close.

Life Story

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A man lives with a woman he loves enough to live with, but not enough to marry and not enough for kids. He knows he could love others enough to marry, enough for kids, but he's not the kind of man to find those women when he's with this woman.Sometimes “love”…

Where the ocean ends

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For my Dad Happy Father's Day!

The Bird King in Love

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1The Bird King has fallen in lovewith a radiator.He adoresher pockmarked skin,her neurotic arias,her coldness,her impulsive warmth. 2Tiring of his dalliance with the radiator,the Bird King woos an armchair.She's amply upholsteredand groans dreamilywhen he sits on…

Full Circle

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I staggered away in the storm tears frozen to my cheeks.