1996 11 4
|
Upon learning the fetus has fingernails, Missy texts her boyfriend: It has nails! He won’t reply because he’s just left for war, but she does it just the same.
|
199555
|
“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.”
|
199543
|
Grace Gibbons is a way of life.
|
199521
|
time. Night after night he's up, restless. What if she knew his plans? If only he'd bypass his miscalculations and slip through
|
1995104
|
What happens to a town when all of its songbirds go on strike?
|
199500
|
“What the hell kind of name is Angel? Who were you with before, some little girl?”
|
19953018
|
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.
|
199400
|
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
|
199410
|
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…
|
199422
|
Her face had that strange preserved quality Maybelle saw in many aging Boomer women — like an old toy never removed from its packaging.
|
199472
|
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.
|
19941311
|
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…
|
199423
|
Follow me around a bit.
Let me walk you through the rooms, structures, and clouds of my being that reveal junk drawers of "collectibles."
|
199385
|
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
|
1993107
|
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,
|
199383
|
“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?”
|
199387
|
After school watching American Bandstand with my two best friends, all three of us lusting after Bunny Gibson who’s all of sixteen, stacked, and very fucking hot.
|
199386
|
She sees Connick Jr. now has a microphone. He is singing “All of Me” as if he meant her to take all of him.
|
199321
|
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.
|
199332
|
your olive-pitting thumbs
|
19932114
|
I don't want / to write about the body indulged, desires / denied, tortures invented, pleasures innate
|
19931310
|
sacred ground bleached with the salt of bitter tears
|
199242
|
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.
|
1992129
|
in which creative destruction holds the heads of entire populations beneath the surface of the water in bathtubs until the bubbles stop
|
1992106
|
—Pretty tulips, said the woman.
|
199254
|
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
|
19923315
|
To envy faith, to envy love --//
is there a fate more hateful? Choices/
scatter like stars. Too many.
|
19922214
|
The night we crossed the Madres my father stuffed his Stetson full of cash.
|
19921412
|
The hour reflected those pleasant moments when evening hunger can be satiated by anticipation alone, before the pangs become demanding.
|
199210
|
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
|
