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Rose Gold

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He hasn't had a wedding ring in years. When George's knuckles began to swell — a little arthritis — his ring dug into his finger so bad his wife Loren took him to the ER and had it cut off. The ring, not the finger. He never knew there was a tool to cut rings,…

Toothbrush

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...and he would stumble from bed in a panic and fling the toothbrush at the mirror cursing all the while "fuck fuck why can't I forget her".

RE[a]D

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Stop! the voice commands in a guttural shriek. Do not move. You are under arrest. But the voice is only in his head; he has created it the way a writer creates characters on a page, and it is just as real to him as if someone were really there.

Meander

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Things are a little out of hand. Information fills room after room after room. I have no bloody idea where I am. I have your photo, but the navigational coordinates are difficult to interpret. Where the hell are you, anyway? I don't like mazes — too much like…

Not Lao-tzu's Magna Carta, xxxviii - xlv

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what is raised up must rest on its foundation.

-And Lurking Behind Quasar 3C295 . . .

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“Let’s see that great big telescope of yours,” she exhaled hotly, “I want to grind your lenses!” The doctoral candidate dutifully stood between her and his massive telescope so her hands would encounter some instrumentation with no optical components.

Band Names

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Post No Bills. The Crouton Mavens. United Burglars Union. Crockpot Mistakes. The Heavy Doors. Fire In the Yurt. Douche Baguettes. Upsy-Daisey. Schmazelhood. Sidetrackia. Flotsam and Jetsam. Argyle Sox. Roachmobile. The Adulterer’

Eve

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When God blessed creation, a ewe gave birth to Adam. When he cursed Satan, Eve hatched from a crocodile's egg.——In naming the animals, Adam marked them for death. His own name was a slow fire. Eve's was an inferno.——In the shelter of the Tree of…

Brown Paper

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“Americans like beer, right?” he asks. “It’s not acceptable for a woman to buy beer.” He proffers it in a brown paper bag.

C.S.I. #14

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I had dreams of being permeated with the heat of Caramelized sisters. A declawed cat kept creeping along my apartment walls.

Dead Woman's Shoes

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Loving you, I always knew, was a job I’d only get via a dead woman’s shoes. There you were, the recipient of pot roasts, fresh bread, at a loss amongst neighbourhood widows and divorcees. A tide of them rolled over you in calico blouses, cut off jeans

Life during Wartime

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Nothing good comes from being lowered into a well to take a photograph, boy

Sing Sorrow Sorrow

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Lean closer, she smiles, smell my perfume let yourself be taken to a wild forest where owls grow and trees fly.

Early Decision

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Melinda said forget the kegger last night, what we’re about to do will help you figure out whether you want to apply here.

DANCING ON AIR

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You were at a saloon on Water Street. Witnesses say. You were taken out of the place and put on a sloop against your will. Witnesses don’t say.

Triplicate

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Redundancy was critical for survival, the builders said, so they designed Us with three cores of memory, each segment fully capable of independent operation.

Self Portrait with Google

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Try it with and without/ middle name or middle initial.// Try different keywords.

'My Mother Was My Sister' — Rejection Letter to a Young Writer (Memoir)

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When I was 10 or 11, some people thought that my father was my grandfather, that my brother was my father, and that my mother was my sister!

Phenomenology

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Someone will labor to keep it alive/ although the body will want but/ to return to random particles

Seascape

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They had been wintering on the Cape under gunmetal skies...

Clarinet

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It’s beautiful to look at and to hold/ though true musicians would be appalled/ by the black plastic

Bullshit Aeneid

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Of arms and the man...

The President is Giving the State of the Nation Address Today

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But the world is smaller when I see it / from the crook of your neck.

Puzzles

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The man went into his backpack and pulled out his book of crossword puzzles. The deluxe edition with fifty percent more puzzles for free. It had been an impulse buy from the bookstore, cost him four…

The Year Michael Got His Own Page in the Yearbook

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You can use your shoelaces or an Ace bandage. Loop a belt around your neck and toss the loose end over a shower curtain or closet pole. Pull. Try to lift yourself off the ground.

The Serious Writer Tracks His Stats

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The officers carried him away in cuffs as he yelled "I NEED STATS! PLEASE! JUST GIVE ME THE STATS!"

We Are Not Joaquin Phoenix

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Joaquin Phoenix has inspired me to quit writing and purse my true lifelong passion.

Burning

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When she told me to write itI did; I scratched out what I wanted to sayin quick print letters. Not all of it.I could never get it all out in an hour but thegeneral idea was definitely there. We had to finish it in the rain becausewe couldn't light the…

The Bird, The Snake, and Me

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The truth about the bird and the snake is this. They are dead. And me? I cannot stop thinking about them.

The Plunderer

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Bill (Gunnery Captain of the Left Hand Gun, HMM Plunderer), while not exactly obese, nor could a disinterested observer call him him rotund, was nevertheless the sort of man who'd never be caught by a famine unprepared. And because of this more than regulation…