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Relic

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While space and time opened up for us, the ground accelerated its attempts to devour the astronaut. Grasses grew up around his edges. Seeds propagated in the folds of his suit, tendrils found their way into the mysterious holes for the missing hoses that

Snapshot

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Behind them all, in the background, a tray of vodka tonics waits on a glass table, the limes losing color as they drown.

Warthearm

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‘Look, look, Quark. Look here. Warthearm. A shiny warthearm.’ Maz was on his elbows and knees, his fat ass sticking out in their air like two cannon-balls ready to be shot off. He was peering at a long, shapeless earthworm, its skin translucent and i

Sex in the Hothouse

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"Heaven-high, choking on our own breath and each other's tongues."

Machine-Gunning Butterflies

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I was making good bread as a New York studio musician and jingle writer, anonymous back-room jobs.

Suburban Snomance

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rump-a-rump, bat-a-tat, barumpabumbum

HOMESTEADING

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She had loved sleeping in Todd’s arms at night, hearing the soft tinkle of crystal above her when cool drafts moved through the house, his hand wandering over the swell of her belly.

Flamingos

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Over fifty plastic flamingos stood silently at attention... as if eating sea urchins out of our lawn.

Duck Sauce

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In principle, Sergeant Brock Lumley resisted superstition, but if you were to stop him on any given day he was patrolling Baghdad streets with his rifle squad and ask him to open the front left ammo pouch on his flak vest, he’d get this look on his face..

Fluff

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I saw the little family that lives under the neighbor's backyard deck two weeks before while decapitating grasslets

The Energy of Girls

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Emma and I were in a shabby part of town with vacant lots and overgrown yards, and I wondered if something would happen as we loped beside Tom, who was slow-witted and 21. We were 13 . . .

Flashes

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The thunder rolled like an old Bob Dylan tour...

Why They Cried: Deano

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When it came time to sell the agency—when the papers came for him to sign—it was a very bad deal. But he did not cry. This was business. He had gambled and he had lost. He signed the papers without a hint of regret and even pried open a case of champa

A Tale of Two Writers

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A famous author and an inspired writer meet at a coffee shop, both looking for inspiration. The patrons there don’t know if this meeting is by accident or design, but they are in awe of Fame.

The balloon of you

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and the mass exceeds the buoyancy/ and gravity pulls you back,

Three Houses Down

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I walked on hot coals. She got ahead of me. (228 words)

Helmet

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The tiles begin inching toward him as soon as he moves. You've seen filings on glass. He's the magnet on the underside.

The Little Things

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When the world is quiet, all your thoughts demand attention.

Modulus of Elasticity

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The limbs lift again,

January 2, 2012

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You always complained that Christmas/ ruined your birthday/ sister.

Clock

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I know it was the ceremonial magician who talked you into it. I know it was supposedly to be what the Enochean Angels needed to come into the vortex and into the world, make it all balanced on all four sides, four elements, so that when the world ended, t

Wasps' Nest

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Here’s how you do it. First you get a ladder, a long one.

Bed Bugs are Jumpin' in Thunder Bay

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The little Hannibal Lectors had run like bandits away from the flames and had latched on to their equipment and gear. They screamed as the bugs crawled all over them. When they got back to the station they had to quarantine all their stuff so the bugs w

Keepers

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His hands go up and down on me. You love me don't you he says. I don't know I say.

Taking a Job

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Teaching never occurred to me in college. I took workshops and wrote often. Friends and classmates, meanwhile, switched from studio majors to Art Education, or from English to Certification. Not me. Teaching high-schoolers would be all wrong. Briefly, I…

The Lonely Genius

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was washing her hands and lookingin the mirror and hoping tosee someone who could tell herthe way home again. She wasn'tsure why she should want to go there except maybe to findthe missing piece that had alwayseluded her. The lonely genius puton her clothes but the…

The Dead

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When i close my eyesI see the faces of the deadI hear their voices The things they said, their laughter The ones i thought would live forever!! Something got them though: the ones who lived fastIt was a drug, some bullets, a disease I thought they would live forever!!Those…

A Way of Life

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Nothing more savory than gossip relayed in confidential tones.

Cats

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My wife and I are cat people. Indeed, that's how we met. We met at a wake.

Ya Sure You Betcha (A Syttende Mai Challenge)

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Nora never dated Scandinavians.