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Proud Military Wife

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Back when they were younger, David was always gushing about every little thing in his head, and his openness appealed to her as much as his muscular frame did. But after that year they spent apart, he was always ... smiling. Smiling and vague.

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…

Shaken But Not Stirred

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It happened right after I had taken my Uzi to work, retrieved it from my Brooks Brothers briefcase, and fired it upon my desk and its assorted discontents, their paper lives bunched together by clips and notary stamps of approval, now set flying and free. I then walked into…

Fade

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I can take you away, away, away.

Our Names Are Written In Water

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Passing us in a delicate swirl of light perfume and healthy girl sweat, three bare midriff elfin, baby dykes with pencil thin eyebrows, and chic art hair cuts, swaggered in like cool young gunfighters straight off the cover of Bad Baby Butch Vogue

10 cities, 7 weeks, 7 countries & poems

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I'm not sure if this is breaking the rules of Fictionaut, but here's a trailer of a poetry tour of Europe I did earlier this year. We hope to break it down into webisodes soon enough to highlight the brilliant readings, brilliant local poets and such that you can find not…

River Run

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yearning amid the waning

Junkyard Angel Baby Nomad

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"We gotta get out of here", you said

Dinner in Mexico

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If he had not just decapitated a chicken, he was a man I could have loved.

I Ain't Your Kissin' Cousin - song

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I ain’t your kissing cousin That’s pretty plain to see Baby, keep your pretty lips Far away from me I ain’t your kissing cousin That’s pretty plain to see You’re really very pretty Come kiss me and we’ll see We don’t live in a barnyard

The Pennsylvania Kaufmann House

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Falling Water almost fell./ 12 million dollars later// it will splay itself a little longer

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.

Daddy's Teeth

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At night, I wake up, and Daddy's in the bathroom with a hanger in his mouth....

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,

the cold the day left

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in our teens as tough as the cold/we wore denim and flannel with our boots/kicking at whichever wind blew . . .

Myra's Mother

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Smoking is like hooking up with an ex-girlfriend: you know she's bad for you and that it won't work out, but it feels so familiar and comfortable and so easy to slide back into.

Wet Work

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blinking out

The Secret

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It was always your body that told so much -- lips working some secret out

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.

Night and the spell that gave me peace

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When you have lived with pain so long, you grow old and the old man inside of you takes over. That’s just the way it is.

Blue Line Southbound

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Brazilian girls yammer with their book bags up against my leg.

Mercury Unbound - 7

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a song jolts my memory . . .

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.

The Seer

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The strange bones of language wander the room.

Broken Waters

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Waiting for the Voice on the Line

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

Biodegradability

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As a boy I fished under the Tappan Zee bridge which spans the Hudson River above New York City.

The Animal Cracker Incident (Part 2)

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“I feel like my bones are melting.” Her arms are wrapped around her body tightly, like she’s trying to hold herself together. She’s shaking; I can hear it with every breath she takes.