2001 13 10
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sacred ground bleached with the salt of bitter tears
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2000 7 4
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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…
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2000 18 14
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it corrupts the smells//
and flavors of the world/
and plants its swollen face
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2000 5 5
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Called in sick at work for a week straight when I first met Tony.
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2000 1 0
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Yellow tape marks a walkway that was previously unknown. Caution, caution. Lounge turned waiting room for a ballroom turned infirmary. An entrance, an exit, caution, caution. The line is of amusement park ride length. But no roller coaster at the end, only an antidote…
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2000 2 1
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time. Night after night he's up, restless. What if she knew his plans? If only he'd bypass his miscalculations and slip through
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2000 3 2
|
your olive-pitting thumbs
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1999 12 9
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in which creative destruction holds the heads of entire populations beneath the surface of the water in bathtubs until the bubbles stop
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1999 8 3
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“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?”
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1999 2 2
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Her face had that strange preserved quality Maybelle saw in many aging Boomer women — like an old toy never removed from its packaging.
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1999 8 6
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She sees Connick Jr. now has a microphone. He is singing “All of Me” as if he meant her to take all of him.
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1999 10 4
|
What happens to a town when all of its songbirds go on strike?
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1998 5 5
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“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.”
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1998 15 10
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. . . quit being so rigid, open up to the pasta.
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1998 12 9
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“Lightning has more longevity than I,”
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1998 5 4
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You know how it is, one day a good friend sends you this long note telling you how-the-hell they are or aren't getting along in the frigging world
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1998 2 1
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For ten minutes I would have to sit perfectly still on the edge of her bed, thinking of Road Runner and the Flash and wishing I could do anything but sit there with my feet in warm, foamy water.
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1998 3 2
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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…
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1998 1 1
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I spent the whole day at Oliveira's, writing furiously in my notebooks. The words came pouring out. Just before seven, Darrell picked me up. I grew anxious driving down to Parker's studio because it was in a bad area on the border between Oakland
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1997 8 5
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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
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1997 7 4
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Juniper Mélange was a cat person, not a dog person. Truly detested when she perceived falseness in another person. She wore glasses and drank tea. Had dark straight hair and light skin. She dressed conservatively and would watch the sky most days. She wou
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1997 5 2
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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
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1997 13 11
|
You were busy, moving, alert inconstant motion; packingbooks, clothes, paintings;deciding yes to this, no to that. I was simply tryingto settle somewhere in the space.We'd known it for years when things were in place. Now, this abrupt interruption of…
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1997 14 12
|
The hour reflected those pleasant moments when evening hunger can be satiated by anticipation alone, before the pangs become demanding.
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1997 16 13
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1996 9 4
|
Three hours isn't that long.
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1996 0 0
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At the edge of the forest, his sister began to complain about how everybody—their mother and father and all of her friends included—hated her. It was exasperating, the light she sometimes put herself in. The fact of the matter was that she received more
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1996 7 2
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He had long since quit listening to the incessant clanging of the bell. He stood, ringing the bell, squinting into the setting sun, nauseous from the car exhaust, his body aching for alcohol.
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1996 18 15
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Together / they peeled and fed each other pink fruit, / ordered expensive pink beef, went on / vacations and viewed pink sunsets / on paradise beaches.
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1996 15 9
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She tells Tuesday's lover that there's nothing wrong with cheap thrills without anesthesia,
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