Most read stories

Staring at a Bird Feeder

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Will it strike suddenly?

Three Houses Down

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

Made in Japan - 2

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My motivation as a filmmaker for traveling to Japan was economic and opportunistic. American military occupation had accelerated westernization and, when Japan regained its sovereignty in 1952, their economy was rapidly expanding. Led by manufacturing and export of items…

Five

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". . . with the impact of a 18-wheeler jack-knifed into a Mini-Cooper as it hits the surface."

COSMOGONY

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I am sitting on our porch in the middle of the night. I can't sleep. The stars look like runway lights. Out of boredom, I reach out my hand to connect the distant dots. The tip of my finger hits…

ANYTHING FOR JOHNNY

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After nine months, I was granted early parole...

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.

Obituary

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I won't fail at this like trying to fix a leaking sink without mud grease or washers tinier than Cheerios.

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

Life, in a slowly roasted nutshell

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You wake up. Slowly but surely. Okay, you're in the bookshop. Yes, apparently this is where you slept, on the floor, with absolutely no sense of irony, in the romantic fiction section...

The Days of The Olde Burying Yard

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“Phennias Jessup is his name. That’s his death’s head scroll, an hourglass, bats, spirals and angel’s wings on either side of the top part of the stone. "

THE OPPOSITE OF A GROWTH SPURT

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I’m aware I will never be a woman the night you leave me for another city

Loveletters

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The leadoff hitter must be comfortable accepting that he will almost never be the hero and will not be anyone's favorite and he will not be the baseball card that is traded for simply because his skills and abilities are subtle.

I Don't Know What I might say

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But it all works out. I guess. Truth is something I'm sure I've never seen before, but the more time goes on, the Less I'm inclined to believe in it. Still I don't want To be one of those giving the finger to God And begging for a showdown with an…

Yesterday That Monday's Sun

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wrenched its lower back trying so hard to lift too many stacked November clouds off the newly shaved prickly heads of the slowly freezing trees,like ring weights,and had to spend the last of its hours setting in a small square box in…

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.

Lines Written in a Honda Civic

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Raymond Carver used to write poetry in his car. / Tonight, I tried it too. / I have a car like Raymond Carver / but cannot write poetry like Raymond Carver. / The car isn’t enough.

Birthday Boy

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The sound of it wasn't right in his head yet. When he said it aloud he didn't really believe it.

Island Music

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Of all the things Shelly hated about her job, the music was the worst.

Moon View Mountain Road

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I once read a book of warnings.

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…

Bravo, Scrittore!

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I hadn't yet assembled enough pieces of Italian to explain any of this, but it was hardly necessary. The fact that I was a scrittore in a language foreign to her seemed to make me especially fascinating...

The Kid Who Knew Something

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Shannon refused to jump from the castle drawbridge to the gigantic truck tire sunk halfway down in the playground quicksand. He just stood there-arms folded across his chest, bony knees sticking out from beneath ratty cutoffs-in silence, looking to Rollie

little incidence - (haiku love series - #1)

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you choose to be mine when you take hold of my hand - silently, i'm yours

The man-faced boy

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And so the man-faced boy grew alone, knowing little of kindness and love. As he grew, he explored the limits of his cold world; crawling in dusty nappies, toddling in hand-me-down rags, at last walking on worn sandals, haunting the edges of human life loo

Funeral

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After the funeral there was a luncheon in the church basement.

Getting It Wrong

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As Gino exited the supermarket, plastics bags in tow, he began doing curls with his right arm. He’d been doing this for years, reasoning that he might as well get some exercise during the walk home.

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 CHAINS THAT KEEP

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I usually idle by Spades Check Cashing on 8th Ave. and catch folks that way. The Homestead cops, they moved stations from a little up Amity to down on 7th, which is closer to Spades, but they leave me alone. I've drove jitneys almost ten years. Only been cited twice,…

Pectoralis Minor

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Her thumbs tucked beneath the waistline of her pants, slightly pulling them down to expose the eternity between belly button and bliss. I looked up at her as I slid my tongue along the rail of her hip, sucking at its point.