Most read stories

Matisse, in the Jardin des Tuileries, 1904

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The World's Worst Mime stood there next to the iron carousel, portraying something, and the crowd understood none of it, except that whatever thing he was trying to portray was not being portrayed well at all.

SHE HAS HER REASONS

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It is a well-known fact that my wife sleeps around. There. I said it and now everyone knows that I too know about my wife. Let me just tell you this one thing; she has her reasons. You ask me how I know that she has her reasons, but who would know better than…

The Bridge

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The Bridge Barstow had not wanted to listen to Griff. Griff was not making the right decisions, or he thought Griff was not making the right decisions. Thought he was walking a…

A Question of Choice

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The contrast can be summed up in a sip.

Coins

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“Have you ever thought what stars are made of?” “No,” he said. The man nodded seriously. “I hadn’t either. Not until I met the Star Catcher. He told me all the stars in the universe are actually coins. Coins! Big coins. Small coins. Different colors

Bird

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That was really the problem with leaving. She had to leave everything, could take none of the perfection with her. Anything she took would’ve been too little, or too much, once removed. Once not in his house, not in his vision or touch, the magic would

Hungry

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D'ya have to be so rough?

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.

Floater

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Just because I’m suicidal doesn’t mean I don’t care about whacking my head on some service railing ten stories down. The fact that I’m going to jump doesn’t lessen my fear of propellers or a broken back.

Eggshells

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The eggs got badder as the cook got madder

Maine

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A constellation appears in the shape of Van Gogh’s missing ear.

Didn't I always let you have one of my cigarettes?

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I liked the taste in my mouth, mint and cigarettes and fresh and filthy.

The Winner

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i never much liked Elvis never did then never do now he was no Kris Kristofferson

The Year, In Review

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And him, now there’s a him. I’d like if he were perfect, but perfect things never are. My daughter says it best, when she contrasts the two of you, “Daddy worked to forget about his problems. When he works, it makes him feel like there is a problem.”

25 Cents at a Time

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He never bothered converting the tip money he pocketed at the Imperial Street 24 hour car wash as his world was replete with 25 cent transactions, making quarters the perfect coin for his realm.

In Passing

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I'm not hungry now The darkness swallows me as they eat. I'm starving now With a pain I can't defeat.

Handy in a Denny's Parking Lot

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A compliment is candy to the heartbroken, oxygen to a suffocating flame. The best hunter picks his prey carefully, selecting his line like an archer pulling an arrow from a quiver, quickly and efficiently, then flick! the line cuts through the air and…

Heavenly Blue Morning Glory

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‘Oh, and try these. ' She handed me a plastic baggy full of seeds that resembled watermelon seeds, only smaller. ‘If these don't work your problem runs deeper...'

A Body Divided, 6

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When I finally went back to school in the fourth grade, after coming down with polio, my classmates were very welcoming, though I couldn't go outside and run around like them yet at recess or lunch time. That would come, just not right away. But it was th

VCR CIA

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When VCRs were invented in the 1970s, the first big user segment was people who wanted to watch porno films in the comfort of their own home. Troy and Lynn's upstairs neighbor, James, an enlisted man in the Navy stationed at Pearl Harbor, had a vast porn…

Museo Libo

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He'd tend the door himself in high lace up boots, orange rhinestone hot pants, a tight black t-shirt, and black boa with orange swirl.

Of Soulful Cheese and Melted Needs

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Two fine-young-things scan the menu board of In-N-Out Burger off Interstate 101. Dressed like twins -- hoop earrings, tank-tops and mini-skirts, ballet pumps — you could hardly tell them apart, except for their Cleopatra and Marilyn Manson hairstyles. As they…

Cellphone Girl (Part II)

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The tsunami started, ironically enough, with a phone call.

Nightcap

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I formed a snowball in my bare hands. Hard as a rock, I let her fly.

Ancestry.com

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Ancestry.com The Liverpool census in 1851 lists him:Thirteen years old, Irish. Occupation: beggar. Only that. I will do more for him.I will see him in torn jacket and too-short pants singing all day of the fields, the cliffs,…

Dublin

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My swinging purse sent saucers tinkling to the tile and the copper-headed waitress flew over, swooping on the shatter, clutching clean forks like a handful of flowers.

Similarities

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She was skinny and with breasts like a wound up skein of yarn.

When Kids Complain

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They say, we have hangnails. I say, I have a bruised leg.

Spring Uprising

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Some people might find it strange and a bit obsessive to mow their lawn every day, but to Shiram it was an irreplaceable part of his daily existence.

Hemingway On Trash Day

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The morning sun rose up over the flat prairie, and the powdery snow crunched as you walked on it, and the air was so crisp it hurt as you took a breath. That is good, I thought. That is how you knew you were alive, and I was truly very alive, and there was not much to do so…