Most read stories

A Butterfly For A Married Woman

17701770 views33 comments22 favs

A married woman requests a butterfly tattoo that won't please her husband from an old tattoo artist.

Motel 6

17701770 views33 comments22 favs

He lit another reed - a new score orchestrating in his head - his thoughts swirling around the older man; there was something else going on here…

The Virgin of Last Resort

17701770 views55 comments00 favs

In a little dirt church at the end of the world stands the ikon of an unrecognized saint.

In the Alley

17701770 views1212 comments77 favs

as i sink down into the shadows crawling like a worm past cold bricks centuries old in my blood

Why We Were Arrested

17701770 views22 comments22 favs

We have a responsibility,” she says, “to enrich our local business community while delivering quality products to customers.” She had brought over some application forms for the Better Business Bureau, and we sit at the big table and fill them out, marki

Faithless

17701770 views11 comment00 favs

She was now sitting in her bathtub. The warmth of the water made her pale, rich vanilla skin flushed with the fullness of circulation as her pores continued to allow the passage of her toxins from her system.

A Brief History of The Real

17701770 views99 comments55 favs

A little contempuous aside by the critical theorist guy, Frederick Jameson-- that it was logically absurd to call anything that human beings do, produce or effect “unnatural,”-- has brought forth the following. We are…

Five Being Ten at the New Afterlife Dance Theatre

17701770 views22 comments44 favs

We got our holes in our hearts bundled onto soft wrapping cloth just like the gentleman on TV said; with smiles we set out towards our matching end of the same old stories. That's just the way…

Takin' a Break

17701770 views00 comments00 favs

The place turns out to have a really nice ambiance, and while the pasta is only passable—though I ordered, I believe, the cheapest plate on the menu, so maybe I got what I deserved—the background dinner music playing is "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot" by Wilco.

The Beast Remembers Its Broken Promise and Starts to Cry

17701770 views77 comments77 favs

It's a good thing too—because Of the way that feeling Made her even more beautiful than usual. You shouldn't doubt such an obvious Feeling. It's a good thing— Because frankly you have Been informed before. When Beauty …

ATF

17701770 views44 comments22 favs

A father's soft neglect has repercussions.

Captains of Industry

17701770 views44 comments22 favs

Renee said, "I have actually slept with a number of Captains of Industry and would rate them, overall, deficient in skills."

Hart Crane Pantoum No. 1

17691769 views1818 comments1313 favs

One must be drenched in words.

Wild Dreams of Reality, 12

17691769 views00 comments00 favs

I went out behind Parker's house and saw Darrell's tent set up in the grass. The flaps of the pup tent were open. I could see him through the mosquito netting. He had a Coleman lamp burning and lay on his back in his underwear on top of his sleeping bag.

Questions Dog First Pooch's Kennel Papers

17691769 views11 comment11 fav

The White House released only a short-form pedigree certificate, which “breeders” claim bears signs of alteration. “The ‘K’ in the middle of ‘AKC’ is longer than the other letters, like an El Greco on an acid trip.”

Agape

17691769 views00 comments00 favs

Every time Hector left his home he wondered if it was for the last time. It was Monday at 2:45, so he was standing in the bedroom near the tall mirror, staring into his dark eyes. In the past, she would lovingly help him dress with her tiny, perfect fingers. She…

The Tapeworm of Selfish Mammon Eats All the Good Will in the World

17691769 views77 comments77 favs

She caretakes, he takes care

SHADOW

17691769 views22 comments00 favs

I am a shadow. Cooler than liquid. I don't need a container to take shape.

Reflections

17691769 views88 comments88 favs

Today the color of the skyremakes my heart into somethingless willing to break, or to judge,and I am thankful for it. Acolor not unlike walking chestdeep in the ocean and seekingbeautiful clouds and thinking Iwill be back. Dreaming with the sky.Please stop lying to me. A…

The Blue Pear

17681768 views11 comment11 fav

The pear is a bruise. Feels like desperation in the light, it looks soft and blue. She wants to touch it and doesn’t want to. How the blood gathers under the blue and the body grows tender. Swells. Slowly.

Four Out of Seven

17681768 views22 comments11 fav

Four nights out of sevenI will lay with youFour nights out of sevenIt's the best I can do In the day, we will bake our breadAt night, ha, we will break our bed!Four nights out of seven, I will be with you

The equalizer

17681768 views22 comments00 favs

It all started with a middle finger. This is where the chain of events began in Benjamin's mind as his mouth filled with the metallic taste of blood and the crunch of broken glass rolled against his teeth. The pickup followed much too closely, but Benjamin was too…

I Wish I Could Say This to Your Face

17671767 views1818 comments55 favs

The day you came home, after three extended tours in Afghanistan, I wanted to welcome you at the bus station, but I was afraid you'd attach yourself to me again.

Still Crazy After All These Years

17671767 views00 comments00 favs

Dr. van Roos reminded the group that trauma is trauma...

Life Experience

17671767 views33 comments33 favs

Karen likes to make a big deal about life experience. Specifically how much more she has than me. What that actually means, she's never made clear. The definition changes and mutates as the years go by, always in her…

Arcana Magi Zero - c.1

17671767 views00 comments00 favs

The moon is now at the corner on pace for the horizon. On top of a tall business building in Downtown Newark stop a woman in a hood cloak.

When the Moon Blooms

17671767 views88 comments66 favs

Your faded presence in sepia dream returns, firelight whispers and vanilla scented ash. We were a beautiful knot: sinew and hemp, burlap and magnolia petal, concrete and vapor. Gray kisses hovered overhead, misty…

Thanks for Looking After Sinamyn

17671767 views1313 comments44 favs

Here are a few tips/instructions to help you out (though I'm sure you'll do just fine by yourself!):Getting to the Apt.:If you're coming from Riverside, you'll want to turn onto Magnolia. So, if you're coming from north to south on Riverside, that means you'll want to turn…

Stones

17671767 views55 comments33 favs

Henry and I had met at the hospital. He'd been forty years my senior, but we'd been in for precisely the same reason: kidney stones.

Why No One Writes Epics Anymore

17671767 views66 comments66 favs

No one writes epics anymore. Why? Perhaps it's because we no longer share mythologies. Once there was a shepherd, and now there is a Google bus loaded with pricks. Yes, you say, but they are good at math. Each and every one of them. And this is true. I envy them…