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Annals of the Naked Rowdies #78

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A true Rowdies fan begins every conversation about the band with a legend. She would be impressed if he knew the story.

Heat

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It was so hot we walked out on our husbands. There were reasons, we supposed. They left the refrigerator doors open all day, grabbing beers when they passed by, tossing the sticky caps upon counters. They drove their Metropolitans to buy food, leaving th

Wednesday late, Friday early

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I wrote this during a poetry workshop at the Atlantic Center for the Arts with Carolyn Forché. January, 2015. So much more has happened since that stunning week.

Adultery and Africa

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“What would you think if I committed adultery?” She pauses very briefly before replying. “What, you got time on your hands?”

Clarinet

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

Ennui of Wings

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Does flight exhilarate the sparrows

The Parade Path

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Beautiful, a country left abandoned by the parade path. The soldiers that typically occupy this place, temporarily removed to neighboring lands; congregating together, backs to the native. I benefit from the accidental diversion.

Ghost Searches Downtown

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No one told a story.

Lunch Bird

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The bird studies me, we lock stares, with no care for who blinks first, birds don’t do macho stand-off.

Journal of Puritan Minister, Jon Sorrim: Fragment 1

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It was the first time I had ever seen a possession.

A Tragedy In Three Acts (St. Petersburg Blues)

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His thought was shattered then by the horrible grind of the telephone in the hall. Surely not for me, he thought. One of the other tenants has a friend who’s landed vipivka, no doubt after 39 straight days of hunt. Booze is so damnably hard to find

A Locked Door.

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I look at that wall, it has piss-stain yellow paint and water scars from several years of leaky pipes. I say I wouldn’t mind that, if he took out some of that wall.

Emotional Gentrification - excerpt Single Stroke Seven

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Sunday, Nolan and I drop by the ice rink on 10th and Alma to watch the amateur hockey leagues battle it out in an unspoken yet assumed class war: the buff, unemployed rink bums who can grind ice, cross-check, and stick handle like the pros, versus the dou

Jim Shows Me Twelve Jesuses

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in cinematic snippets, ten-second scenes of twelve Sons …

I Am Not A Careful Reader

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What's the weirdest thing you've ever used as a bookmark? I work in a library. I've seen that, and more.

Ojibwe

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"Did I have a choice? Could I just open my eyes, did I have to ‘see’ as he was telling me now I could? I decided to go for it. What did I have to lose? This was all a dream, too much driving to get here, too much reunion, too much food, too much beer. Or

Lewd in the Library!

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The Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue just came out, and all over America librarians are flipping through its pages and rolling their eyes. The swimsuit issue, which isn't actually about swimwear at all, but, is, instead, about young, beautifully shaped female…

How To Write Funny

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I've never really been impressed with authors that write long teary-eyed novels about people dying of terrible diseases or uplifting stories about the armless boy who made the wrestling team.

Running

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On the way home, “Friendly honk,” he said.

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.

Smart Bar

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Everything is painted black that isn’t glass, velvet, neon, or chrome. The club is cold, and the DJ who broke-up with me while I forgot I was stoned is spinning his favorites to an empty floor. Endings have a rhythm. I heard this one coming. I can hear it

Getting Sideways On Douglas

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Under the dirty orange glow of sodium streetlights, the glistening pavement looks slick, but it’s only just wet. The mid-November temperature is cool—quite mild, actually, for this late time of year—still hovering in the upper 30s—so far posing only the

On Being Bald....

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Hair today...gone tomorrow The sun beats down on my balding crown.

Poems I posted on social media, late night, when I was drunk.

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my God, I have no time, no time

Fascination

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Lying all over itself...

Tomatoes and Onions on the Bed

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That led to the first aid box on the bed at 3 in the morning, but what about those veggies?

The Bird

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We lived on the edge of a tiny Iowa town, and picked corn fields were steps away.

Segment from a Documentary Film

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the array of regularly spaced wavering human forms floating upright seems to extend endlessly in all directions.

The Flute Player

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The man who plays his flute every day under the archway near Powell station is not very good. He never plays a real tune, just a series of random notes. There is no rhythm or melody either. In fact, it's not even a flute he…

Marriage

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Freshly fucked, Shirley exhaled enjoying the lingering sensations. She always felt lighter after a good orgasm, and this had been one for the record books.