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Seasonals

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Jasmine as skeined skins… of liquid hers, by willow courts, the lychee's water wains: as apple-moats flush fawn in russet light, through cherry floats, the leopard-dots of dawn. Branch to branchlet green …

Breath of Fresh Air

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He lost his patience and began ranting and raving, angry that he had to come home every night and feel like he was being smothered by a pillow. “I can’t make it stop,” she said. “I can’t make myself stop feeling this way.”

Of the smokers I’ve kissed

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The man next to me on the Shinkansen from Tokyo to Kyoto makes me think of the smokers I’ve kissed.

Out of Character

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Co-workers have started calling him Jesus, Manson, Foghat, Doobie Brother, hippie, hipster, Grizzly Adams, Dude Lebowski... there’s really no end to it.

Hail to the Pres: Celebrating Lester Young's Birthday

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At a time when jazz had its share of royalty–kings, dukes, and counts–Young was democratically elected the President by an aristocratic vote of one; the best jazz singer alive, his sometime lover Billie Holiday.

Believing Everything I Read In Your Upturned Eyes

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It doesn't have to be force grown betweenus. We entwine naturally. It's agood feeling to have a friend who at oncedoesn't require a hothouse ceiling laidbetween each invisible touch. There's justwind. There's just rain. There's just sun. There's just you.There's just…

Walking To Gibraltar, Chapter 8: In Which Love Is Declared

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Astrid hadn't always hated him. They met at the Beta house in the fall of his junior year. Typical Friday night. Stoned, drinking beer. He and Red Chapman sitting in their room playing guitars. The girls in their blues jeans. The guys from the house hi

Midnight Mass

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Mom wraps a bulky-knit scarf around my face and over my mouth. She tightens it into a big knot in back of my collar.

The Poetry of Wallace Stevens' Secretary

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What in the name of God’s green earth does this say? “Chifferobe if you can of Aztec in coffee can”?

River Run

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yearning amid the waning

The Edge of the World

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I am far from home, wherever that is.

Oversleeping & Getting in Trouble for It

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A few people bristled and looked at Jim, but since he was avoiding their gaze, they had no choice but to return their attention to their own table and pretend to pay attention to the conversation they previously had been pretending to pay attention to.

Beyond Penderecki

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From a window, the young Pole Krzysztof Penderecki saw resistance fighters hanged by Nazis...

blink

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far from this time

Landing

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She’s witnessed her mother’s terror on the day of the hurricane, and she demanded for the first time in her life that her mother do something her mother did not want to do.

Predator

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Uncounted hens and piglets/ die at my demand. The killing floor// runs red for me. I am/ monstrous to creatures small and great,

Rwanda Suite: The Congo in Me

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I scratch a red welt onto the inside of my white knee. The knee itches like crazy. Pain too, down to my bones. The Congo calls.

I'm Face Blind. Who The Hell Are You?

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The real problem with being face blind isn't that you can't recognize faces. It's that people expect you to be able to.

Two Micros

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She always wore a little smile. When she took off her robe, the class grew quiet.

Mobile

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They stand together in the doorway looking at the crib.

Raw Meat

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I took Annie to the zoo, and the tigers got out. The little tigers, that is. Cubs. Two of them. The zoo employees scurried about, peeking into nooks and crannies.

Cow

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“He looks funny again,” the twins would say. “Cow looks funny, Mummy.”

One of Us

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“We’re starting to get into weather control,” Mark said. “Can you really do that?” Rachel asked, trying to sound supportive and not skeptical. “There are people out on the west coast in Seattle, who’ve been experimenting with it,” Mark said. “Bec

Gogol vs. Quixote

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“We all come out from Gogol's 'Overcoat'," said Dostoevsky. Well, sometimes, I think otherwise.

Mourning

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It was a phone call we never expected. You were so full of life and joy and the sound of your laugh was pierced in our minds. Two strokes. That's what they said. No explanation, no back story. We worried we would lose you. Immediately, all of our memories with you started…

Last Bell

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Coward, cuckold, she taunts: So be it. He's not a young man anymore, nor as clever as he once was, or thought.

Devoured Worship

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This wasn't going to be about her anymore.She tied her strong purple balloon to the neck of the wounded horse. Her skirt and her top felt like armor's breath. The tingle across her scalp felt warm. Small rug scrapes that made her think of her last dog, before she died.This…

Waiting for the Voice on the Line

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hoping for a happy outcome/ like a kindly voice on the line

Hunting CHUD (for the April Fools Day challenge)

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CHUD were everywhere.

BABY MOUSE

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BABY MOUSE She and the baby squeeze into the neon blue star-studded rocket ship in front of K-Mart, a tight fit because the baby's still inside her and the ship is made for under ten year olds and the steering wheel dents her stomach and the baby backs up and…