Most read stories

Flipping Off People With Romney Bumper Stickers

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“Hey,” I begin, a naughty smile breaking across my face before I can get to the punchline, “Want to drive around flipping off anyone with a Romney bumper sticker?” Kaleb chuckles and beams at me. It seems everyone likes a good girl turned naughty.

evening cigarette

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It's short.

MYTHO-THERAPY ON THE BLINK

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

I Remember Kitty D.

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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.

A Spark and a Flash

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Butchie was the one who heard about the bonfire happening over on Harrison Avenue.

Please, tell me of the smell of the moon

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Do you know first hiss of batter hitting groundnut oil in a shallow pan, I ask, on a morning after a long, dream-ridden sleep?

Potentially Naked Waitress

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

Wesson

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I'm not. I am.

We All Look So Perfect As We All Fall Down

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My server wore cat's eye glasses, a Wonderbra that made her breasts like the embryos from Alien wanting to burst their way out of her Hooters t-shirt but couldn't.

The Argument

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"What mouths could not say, hands did."

Egypt.

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When the sky was thinner and water faster, we would chase the falling stars.

Incidentally

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

Oaxaca Dreamland

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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.

Parrot

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"Your mother does sailors," the parrot screeched.

Virginity

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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.

2006, What I Wanted

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freedom from my mind

My Name is Philippe

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I ought to see, in Mr. Smith's dilated pupils, the projection of his last reverie.

Librarians! What Are We Hiding?

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Librarians are hiding something. What is it?

Quail

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I can’t take my eyes off a tall blonde with green eyes. I catch her eye.

Mare

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She pulls out of love, while you sit upon the rumble seat, a granted is taken for every crack of the whip. She pulls out of fear. She pulls.

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…

Lipstick in the Kitchen

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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.

City Girls Never Need Car Keys

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But they all know the parking prayer...

Autumn in the Afterward

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A year after we'd last spoken I can still remember your commentary, our ill-fated reunion at the baggage claim forever immortalized as this solitary instance of unobstructed joy.

Laughingly rejected by The New Yorker

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...and we laughed.

The Hiders

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The Kharal kept us safe, we knew, kept the colony functional in the oft belabored effort that was living our small, human lives surrounded by death, for in their ring of constant invisible protection, when they did not come, we thrived. It was not as tho

Forever Four-Eyed

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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…

The Spoken World

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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.

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

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master carvers do not reduce with carving.

Halfhearted Objections

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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.