Most read stories

Courtroom (Philip Guston)

19331933 views66 comments33 favs

They’ve thrown the painter in the trash upside down with his red pajamas and feet sticking up in the air, with his shoes on. The large red hand of judgement pointing at him, that gives us direction and law and shame, gives us a large red headache. Whi

Bunny Ears

19331933 views00 comments11 fav

Word traveled fast at school on Monday. Emma Jakowski had actually captured him. He was being held in her dad's tool shed. Anyone who wanted to see him had to be in the Jakowski's backyard by 3:15 that afternoon, chocolate bunny ears in hand. It was no…

Frostproof Suite: Saint John’s Eve

19331933 views1111 comments88 favs

Everyone at the Bermudez Brothers Combined Shows and Circus held one low opinion or another about Jimmy Dubcek.

My Almost-Clash with The Rolling Stones (Memoir)

19331933 views44 comments22 favs

I'd been living in Boston, but, on a whim, flew to London, England. Soon I was working as support staff for the actor Alan Bates and his wife, Victoria, on a movie called "The Shout", shooting in Devon.

This, About The Man I Met Out Here In Nearly Nowhere

19331933 views33 comments22 favs

Out here in nearly nowhere I met this man. About him I know something something, and no one can tell me otherwise.

Paperwork

19331933 views11 comment00 favs

There were literally thousands of criteria that got people of every stripe and strata on the list, which had been maintained since before the very first human fingers scrawled crude images on blank surfaces. 

Mayweather

19331933 views2020 comments1818 favs

where I'm from

Beards

19331933 views33 comments22 favs

One day my mother's lover shaved his beard and legs. Said he couldn’t fit into his tight jeans anymore.

Arcana Magi - c.27: Hard Battle

19321932 views00 comments00 favs

A burst of mud spilled out over Jonas and scooped his body up like a raging river. It spun his body over in a rebound rather than pushing him through the door.

A Dispatch from an Enivironmental Lawyer Who is Trying to Grow a Mustache

19321932 views11 comment11 fav

Angelina Jolie, seducer of Brad Pitt, tattooed mother of rescued orphans, and the unlikely daughter of Jon Voight who broke Billy Bob Thornton's heart, is only two blocks from me, in a travel trailer on Seventh Street, gently rousing herself from sleep.

An Old Peach

19321932 views00 comments00 favs

Allen would stroll the remains of the orchard, reminiscing with Tad, flirting with dementia.

How the Body Prepares Itself

19321932 views1818 comments1414 favs

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

halloween haiku

19321932 views88 comments77 favs

a dry bony voice/from a desiccated soul/coughs up its own throat.

The Killer

19321932 views88 comments44 favs

It don't knock you down to the goddamned ground and push your face into the mat and dare you to get back up. Just so it can knock you down again. They don't have real dreams. Dreams that make them wake up in the middle of the night. Hurting. Wanting.

Threads

19321932 views77 comments44 favs

She said he was missing the whole point: it was a decoration, not an actual pillow. You were supposed to place it somewhere artful.

To the Manchester Children's Monster

19321932 views99 comments88 favs

“As you do it unto the least of these so you do it unto me.” —Jesus These children that you murder are not your enemy. They are not your pain or your personal sorrow. They are, if anything, flowers blowing and …

profanity

19321932 views1717 comments1616 favs

@#$!

Cherry Stem

19321932 views55 comments55 favs

He moved his rotten breath closer to my mouth, like he wanted to twirl his tongue around just to see how it felt.

Underwhelmed

19321932 views44 comments33 favs

fifteen together with a little streetart slamtrick

Far Star Girl

19321932 views88 comments33 favs

She thought maybe an angel had called out her name. She wasn't sure. She was waiting for her older sister to return with Jujy Fruits and bonbons. The theater, neither light nor dark, was to Cassie's ten-year-old mind, an appropriate-enough setting for a v

the symmetry of Aldo Rossi's handrails

19321932 views1414 comments99 favs

It would be another difference a building has from a “sculpture”. It would be something that even photographers would have difficulty in disguising, since many modern buildings, even many modern photographs of buildings, place such emphasis on symmetry. For both…

The Dooleys

19311931 views22 comments22 favs

Mama told me never to play with the Dooley boys. They play too rough, they’re not to be trusted, and no one has seen Mrs. Dooley since she tried to clean out their tree house. Mama would always say, “You play with the Dooley Boys, you play with Satan.”

Gemma's Story

19311931 views1414 comments77 favs

I respect mom, she survived cancer and all while she was pregnant with me, but something about getting through all that crap made her heart tough, like an over-cooked piece of beef, and no one likes meat you have to chew forever.

John & Jackie

19311931 views00 comments00 favs

By the time I learned how much I loved my family, I was 3 years and eight-hundred miles away from them

Why They Cried: Roy

19311931 views22 comments11 fav

“Where did it go? You don’t know do you?” he teased the dogs as he adjusted the bottle rocket he had twisted into the ground at his feet, trying to find the optimal path.

My Tongue

19311931 views1111 comments55 favs

A nun once told me to watch my tongue. This is not an easy thing to do.

Half-and-Half

19311931 views22 comments11 fav

Terry worked in a factory out in Northlake where she added a little squirt of milk and another little squirt of cream to those tiny half-and-half coffee creamers you find at every motel in the country. The owner of that factory hired only women to work

Melancholy Happiness

19301930 views99 comments44 favs

It's only 4 lines.

Trout Fishing in America Shorty lives on after the death of his dear friend Richard Brautigan, though sadly

19301930 views1212 comments1111 favs

Maybe, after years of writing poems like letters, he began to notice that no one ever wrote him back.

All The Right Steps

19301930 views00 comments00 favs

"I didn’t take my mother’s denial of my dream lightly. I wanted it desperately. I cried and pleaded, nagged and begged. On several occasions, I temperamentally got out of the car at a stop sign and walked. Once, my mother said that I was nagging her so mu