Most read stories

City Girls Never Need Car Keys

18261826 views22 comments33 favs

But they all know the parking prayer...

I Remember Kitty D.

18261826 views2020 comments1111 favs

When the car arrived, Kitty bounded out, lipstick-stained cigarette dangling, silver hair tightly teased. We could not escape her hug, smelling of peppermint and Aqua-Net and Jean Nate.

Five Million Yen: Chapter 1

18261826 views44 comments11 fav

The DC-9 bounced in the turbulence over the north Pacific waking the dozing Ben Clarone.

Potentially Naked Waitress

18251825 views55 comments44 favs

just wondering what one does when age and job skills narrow one's career options

Eggshells

18251825 views2222 comments88 favs

The eggs got badder as the cook got madder

The Argument

18251825 views1010 comments88 favs

"What mouths could not say, hands did."

Halfhearted Objections

18251825 views88 comments66 favs

The old man behind the counter recognizes fear and anxiety in the boy's face, and sees the brown paper bag clenched in his other white-knuckled hand.

Keep the Change

18251825 views22 comments22 favs

Jacob could tell it was a man he had just walked past, a broken man with an olive green Vietnam era military jacket, a man who had probably served his country as honorably as anyone chosen at lottery and forced to kill for a subsistence wage…

Love, a comet, omens and wings

18251825 views33 comments33 favs

My love for him like wax wings/ so long they stretched eternal— beating in the sky, grazing peaks,

Oaxaca Dreamland

18251825 views1111 comments66 favs

She thinks she trusts this man; she wants to trust him. His face reminds her of a man who once took care of her on an airplane when she was a kid traveling by herself.

Lipstick in the Kitchen

18251825 views88 comments44 favs

In the middle of the floor squatted a sway-backed butcher block that appeared to have been chopped upon with such force as to make it cower.

MYTHO-THERAPY ON THE BLINK

18251825 views00 comments00 favs

Once upon a time, not so long ago in Los Angeles, Jack and Jill Woodman’s father remarried.

Wasps' Nest

18241824 views1313 comments77 favs

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

Spinning

18241824 views22 comments33 favs

Ride me, I say, and you never hear. No matter how I shine my padding, it's never what draws you to me. I only get to touch you when you feel guilty, and most of the time, it's only through shorts and graduated compression socks. What does my desire matter? It all comes out…

The Spoken World

18241824 views1313 comments33 favs

The spoken world is bigger than I had ever imagined it to be, wonderful and relentless and unforgiving, and to be a part of it was my grandest childhood fantasy. I don’t know what the world sees me as now, but inside I will always be a stutterer.

Luc

18241824 views22 comments22 favs

Her wrinkles came into focus, the sort of old woman's face photographed for coffee tables and art galleries and corporate boardrooms, for prize juries and grant selection committees, and Luc searched his formidable memory for an exact match. Over the long, tedious…

Incidentally

18241824 views33 comments00 favs

It started (or maybe ended) with the boot flying off the balcony and bouncing in the dead grass in front of our building.

Our 2015 Holiday Letter…Sort Of

18241824 views99 comments44 favs

“Why do I have to sign these cards? You haven't written your dreaded holiday letter yet.” “I told you not to complain or you'd be the one writing it. And addressing the envelopes. Then you can stamp them and take them to the Post Office!” …

Well, I LOVE Darkness . . . But I've Chosen YOU!!!

18241824 views11 comment11 fav

The elevator door opened, and Tom ("The Baffler") Frank found himself confronted by Jesu bar Joseph, who opined: "You're WORTHLESS!" and recommended: "Why dontcha PULL your PANTS down, and CUT your COCK off!"

Listen To Our Birds

18241824 views99 comments88 favs

We know a poem isn't going to stop you From invading our town. It won't get you to Listen to our birds any more than to our Sunsets. That's not why we do it. We know A poem isn't going to break the blade of Your knife like an…

2006, What I Wanted

18241824 views1818 comments1212 favs

freedom from my mind

Forever Four-Eyed

18231823 views77 comments66 favs

I'm a librarian. A reader. I identify as a four-eyed person. I've always worn glasses. I got my first pair in the second grade. It was a miracle! The blurry world I'd inhabited all my life suddenly came into focus. I could see the blackboard! I could read street signs! I…

Oedipus Speaks

18231823 views33 comments11 fav

I don’t know what happened. One day I was in her room, groping the various drawers for hidden condoms, glimpses of women’s undergarments and I found a spectacular pair of blue lace panties

Not Lao-tzu's Yellow Brick Road, xxviii - xxxvii

18231823 views99 comments77 favs

master carvers do not reduce with carving.

All the Broken People

18231823 views1919 comments1414 favs

We all// fall short and fail.

Dreamphone Sleepover

18231823 views44 comments11 fav

Cassie cradles the loaf-sized phone – pinker than any girl – and dials. he's not wearing a hat says the phone and we all scratch our pencils on the boy-list.

Arcana Magi Behind the Scenes: The Rule of Mana Ver 2.0

18231823 views00 comments00 favs

A Nonfiction behind the scenes look at how Mana works in the world of Arcana Magi.

Being In Love Is For High Schoolers Or Middle Aged Divorcees

18231823 views66 comments44 favs

But who am I kidding. We aren’t in love. Being in love is for high schoolers or middle aged divorcees exploring their sexuality. Our love is real, sweaty, backwards, forwards, angry, trusting. We love as you only can after seeing someone at their best and

Virginity

18231823 views1212 comments44 favs

It rises rigid and plumb from its heavy base, the severity of line yielding to grace only at the throat where it crests into a subtly constrictive pinch.

The Escapists

18231823 views1414 comments1212 favs

I sought to feel something. I hunted my mortality. I craved that rush of life pulsating through my veins.