Most read stories

The Weaver's Tale

19391939 views33 comments22 favs

‘Hmph! Dream indeed! “Past the wit of man to say what dream it was” - the man's a knotty-pated arse.' The old master-weaver spat into the fire, his rheumy eyes bright with contempt, then looked round furtively; Nathaniel was not yet returned,…

Mutants

19391939 views11 comment00 favs

Elin and I had religious differences about the garage. To her the garage required regular sweeping and organization--it was an extension of our house. Elin believed dust and mold to be manifestations of inner sin. I insisted that they were agents of evolu

ROAD LESSONS

19391939 views77 comments00 favs

"Do you have to call your brother a loser? He is not a loser and that was just uncalled for"

Forgive Me Mamma

19381938 views00 comments00 favs

His footing unsure and his clothes covered in vomit, he grabs the railing and stumbles up the three steps. He pulls off his shirt, finds a cleaner area on the puke-covered garment, wipes sweat off his forehead, dripping wet from the humid, stormy night, a

When the Songbirds Went Silent in Cheerytown

19381938 views1010 comments44 favs

What happens to a town when all of its songbirds go on strike?

Kin of His

19381938 views3030 comments1818 favs

I dreamed that coffee grounds had spilled on my Buffet. There was another clarinet, a silver one, that belonged to a man not in the room, that was clean of debris.

Beyond the Wire

19381938 views1212 comments55 favs

Thistle and cracked corn were thrown to us each morning and the occasional live chicken...

Hunger

19381938 views88 comments88 favs

It took all four of his kids to convince my father to pull the plug. Mom's car crash had left her a vegetable, but of course he hung on. Once they withdrew life support, she was gone in ten minutes. The first thing our father said was that he was hungry. He felt…

3 Kids

19371937 views1414 comments1515 favs

There he was, naked and covered in green mud

The Clod and the Pebble

19371937 views1212 comments99 favs

“Lightning has more longevity than I,”

Letter to the Bean Factory

19371937 views66 comments22 favs

The figure was covered in a light blue chenille bathrobe, splayed out on her back on the floor by the glass door, her hair done up in large curlers, a slipper lying askew by her left foot. Richie crouched near the face and the rancid flame of bourbon lea

Prairie Rose

19361936 views77 comments44 favs

Every Friday night she gets liberated at The Haymarket Square doing a bunny hop or a do si do with ex-members of The Saint Augustine Women's Choir. She remembers how as kids, shy or awkward in dresses, their voices formed the harmony, the flight of something V-shaped…

Trio of Found Poems

19361936 views22 comments11 fav

Paper Bird, Devotchka, TV On The Radio

I A Dog

19361936 views44 comments11 fav

I am a dog – four legs, a tail, a carefree enough manner, I do this, I do that, get into fights, sniff the ground and so on

Things I Will Miss Once the Apocalypse Is Done

19361936 views2525 comments1717 favs

The scent of fresh cut grass./ The idiot sense of accomplishment/ mowing the lawn can bring.

Cripple

19361936 views77 comments22 favs

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

77 Words About Nothing (Triad)

19361936 views1515 comments77 favs

My mind has started to finish thoughts at 77 Words. These are just a few.

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

19361936 views88 comments88 favs

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.

Days of Thor

19361936 views88 comments55 favs

Mars' circled state is slain, no bird of Jove That roosts protected in its green youth's flush; Its storms no more bring moistness from above, From blue beads cradled in one thunder's flash. The god of War was husband once to Love: Her arms were …

NAN : A Novel-In-Stories

19361936 views00 comments00 favs

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.

Zhou Yu’s Train

19351935 views1010 comments55 favs

Are we like a poem, a short hand of words curtained together, evoking a mood, but in the end, impenetrable? We follow the clues to our lover's heart and what we find isn't him at all but ourselves. We fill every part of his life, every part of his past and even become…

Old Photo, 1948 or so

19351935 views99 comments66 favs

I’m maybe only four. Not smoking cigarettes found in street gutters yet. That will come the next year, when I’m five. Maybe when I’m six, and Andy’s five, my pal from across the street. That’s my tricycle parked behind this pack of kids that look to be ne

"at 'night' any night is can't"

19351935 views66 comments00 favs

“In the process, I’ve created this memory track. Yet had the sense that I had to make fixed memories move as illusion, that they move as illusion.”

Beds

19351935 views55 comments55 favs

Called in sick at work for a week straight when I first met Tony.

Aloha

19351935 views1010 comments99 favs

It’s a little known fact that eels are often lost in translation – only the spotted variety, not the striped or the common and certainly not the electric.... I think about that lovely hippie girl and her knowledge of eels, sometimes.

Thunder at Midnight

19351935 views44 comments44 favs

I’ve had it to here you see.

Fear in a Handful of Dust / National Poetry Month 2015 30 Poems

19351935 views2121 comments1212 favs

Fear in a Handful of Dust

When He Left it all to Me

19351935 views3636 comments2020 favs

Where did you go?

A Silent Scream

19351935 views22 comments22 favs

She hated the noiseless dying sound they made as he stuck the hook through their eyes. She always wanted for them to scream, but they never did. They didn’t even blink.

Roanne's Dream

19351935 views77 comments33 favs

Roanne banged the chiva, turned tricks, and ran out of road.