Most read stories

Frog Kissing

20072007 views44 comments22 favs

All right, so the frog I risked my lips on (not to mention the contents of my stomach) . . . .

Though the Heart be Still as Loving

20072007 views22 comments11 fav

With my heart preserved, I shoved a handful of baubles back in its place: some pages torn from my favorite books, a bass guitar string, a butane lighter, a shot of vodka. I stitched myself back up and left the roof in favor of the attic, where I hung my s

Avatar Of Chaos

20062006 views55 comments55 favs

He has one good eye and is missing the other. The socket of his missing eye squints with a disturbing and unfathomable insight.

The Woman Who Cut Down Her Husband

20062006 views1616 comments1414 favs

The woman carried a wooden log which was her husband into the house.

Castanets '84

20062006 views22 comments11 fav

At 1 a.m. Route 205 is empty. Del drives. Carla sits in the darkness with the directions to the Nassau County Jail on her lap...

The Sex Life of Your Mouth

20062006 views1010 comments00 favs

"What say we adjourn to the bedroom and I give you a little demonstration of sexual acrobatics?”

Mud

20062006 views33 comments33 favs

People ask me sometimes what it’s like to meet your wife when you’re six years old, and I have to admit now that I don’t really understand the question. Marla and I, we were just friends for most of that time. She made me laugh. I let her crib off my math

The Bicycle Mechanic

20062006 views1414 comments1212 favs

The hour reflected those pleasant moments when evening hunger can be satiated by anticipation alone, before the pangs become demanding.

A Silent Scream

20062006 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.

Strange Bird

20062006 views1616 comments1313 favs

shortest yet

Polaris

20052005 views1010 comments77 favs

Things get lost in Big John, too. I see the other guys throw jokes about his size at his body that wedge their way into his armpits or into the wrinkles of his laugh lines and disappear. I’m not sure if it all disappears to remind us how small we are,

Grace Gladys Gibbons

20052005 views44 comments33 favs

Grace Gibbons is a way of life.

Tuning Pegs

20052005 views22 comments22 favs

Her face had that strange preserved quality Maybelle saw in many aging Boomer women — like an old toy never removed from its packaging.

Gastronomy

20052005 views33 comments22 favs

your olive-pitting thumbs

Disparity

20052005 views1313 comments1010 favs

sacred ground bleached with the salt of bitter tears

Starspeak

20042004 views44 comments22 favs

So if we all have an idea what goes down when the young person at the cash register (the registerista?) asks, “Can I help you?” then we all know there’s a different way to habla at Seattle’s gift to the world.

How the Body Prepares Itself

20042004 views1818 comments1414 favs

it corrupts the smells// and flavors of the world/ and plants its swollen face

Big Dipper

20042004 views55 comments55 favs

“You’re not in Saigon anymore, Mai Bi'ch,” I said, craning to read her name badge. “They’ll need to be much better than that if you want to stay in this country.”

Beds

20042004 views55 comments55 favs

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

Papadad: a portrait

20042004 views1212 comments1313 favs

Papadad has one good eye. The other fell out during a rant and has since been replaced by a rifle scope, which he uses to scrutinise enemies.——Papadad is an authority on everything, even topics he has not researched. He expatiates on these at the dinner table,…

Pink

20042004 views1818 comments1515 favs

Together / they peeled and fed each other pink fruit, / ordered expensive pink beef, went on / vacations and viewed pink sunsets / on paradise beaches.

Post-Op

20042004 views1515 comments99 favs

She tells Tuesday's lover that there's nothing wrong with cheap thrills without anesthesia,

Backwards

20032003 views55 comments11 fav

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

The Tall Man’s Secret

20032003 views88 comments55 favs

For the next two hours, Ed goes nonchalantly about his business, buck naked the whole time. He putters around the house, writes e mails, waters plants, vacuums the rug and sweeps the porch. I pretend to ignore his nudity

fire and ice

20032003 views88 comments33 favs

“Who says?” she purred in reply “They all do” he countered smiling , chewing on an ice cube “All of them, huh?” She leaned forward, raising a wicked left eyebrow and whispered, “And just who are they, anyway?”

The Short Life Of Shapes On Sun-Kissed Eyelids

20032003 views88 comments66 favs

She sees Connick Jr. now has a microphone. He is singing “All of Me” as if he meant her to take all of him.

When the Songbirds Went Silent in Cheerytown

20032003 views1010 comments44 favs

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

She tolled me

20032003 views55 comments22 favs

You’re mad as a hatter she said. Eons, eras of epochal proportions go by before you call me. I said recalibrate your linear thinking, incubator baby. I whispered permutations of wonder, told her secrets only the sufis know. We ate French goat cheese lac

Sonnet Nought

20032003 views33 comments22 favs

Miraculous tarantulas, and octopii, have many limbs akimbo, Two have you: and they are better than be kept in zoo. Thine eyne are like the marbles that my youth had held in limbo, ‘Cept even better yet, for they are fairly lashed and greeny-blue. Your…

Visitation Hour

20032003 views55 comments11 fav

She watches too much VH1 for a five-year-old.