Most read stories

Small Talk

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Her fingers scampered over the table, practicing the deft stitching of the basilar artery.

Popcorn Tigers

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The last row of furniture is all black leather. In unison the tigers hop onto a couch a piece, sit calmly on their haunches, and reach for remote controls buried in the cushions. Roaring, they paw at the remotes.

Air Conditioning Bill

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The last night, I shivered in bed until three a.m., the blankets wouldn’t work, or the socks, or my tears, but I reassured my heart that my next love would be warmer. 
He was. 
And our air conditioning bill was so high we could’t afford it.

Perdition

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There existed within them the deeper perdition, of course, the perdition of culture, American culture, the 21st Century suburban version, made up of Strip Malls From Hell.

Klarheit oder Genug

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F.B.I. then or: "I said later 'for a boob job' and imagined her, a public lawyer, wandering Arizona on foot unable to hide a Playboy-Mansion style rack."

Processes

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How to Boil Water How to Cook an Egg How to Eat How to Think How to Love How to Die

A note from Liu Xiabo

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I think about the weight of those words—how they are silenced by the weight of stone, by the weight of 11 years in a Jinzhou prison cell,

Bliss

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When he got out of sick bay, they moved him into a room with three other alkies. A kid, a tree trimmer, and a Catholic priest.

Rio, 1946

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Now his daughter was an American citizen and Max wanted only the chance to board the SS Maua and disembark in New York.

The Big Name Buttons

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Pay attention: our names were Bobby, Didi, Joanie, Mitch and Sam. It was popular in those days to wear big name buttons across your chest, and we’d line up side-by-side as we watched our reflections affix said buttons, anchoring them to our stiff lapels

Agnés and Albertine

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Albertine had never loved Agnés. Oh! She had liked her very much. Especially her wit, the skin at the nape of her neck, even the two freckles on her arse that would bloom when licked.

the best laugh i've had all day

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when down the street/ a female cat/ yowls with the force/ of a red light blazing/ in an alley.

The Man who was followed by butterflies

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They hovered and darted but, after a while, they seemed to be always around him. Lapping at him like the mellow waves that stroked the muddy bank.

Badface Investigates - Fighting

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I’m lying on the floor curled up in the foetal position and about six people are stamping on me. [...] It’s really confusing down here, what with all the kicking.

Buzz Kill

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Blood had soaked through his Converse All-Stars, and into his cotton sox. It was the smell of metal, of iron more specifically, that nudged his mind out from the fog of shock and denial, closer to the reality of his circumstances.

Swiss Miss Index

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Rye goods * Cracker brot: best practices * Recipes: never embellish! * Boughten: what to avoid

Van Gogh: Sidewalk Cafe at Night

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The heart of those stars is a dab of yellow light. The darkness of the blue night appears so deep because the downward strokes of the actual sky are interspersed with a violet that’s almost black,

That's It

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I am heading to work. It's early and Clare is still asleep. When I hit the breezeway I realize that I forgot my keys. I walk back into the house and start rustling through the junk on the table by the door. After a moment I sense someone standing behind me and…

Dark Horses

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I'm in Joel's front yard when I dodge the third call from my divorce lawyer. I'm here for Joel; I can't seem to show up anywhere unless it's for someone else. We watch his son, Andy, push his bike up the hill. This is the…

Buzzkill.

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[EXPLETIVE DELETED]

The Mermaid's Revenge

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Lapping salt beads from/ my crackling, ecstatic lips.

Wink

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It's just another night in the old city, perched in the skeletal radio tower with my collection of telescopes

Nineteenth Century Noise

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The virtuoso tortures a violin/ in homage to Paganini.

Falling Off The Roof

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"As the thing lurches upright, I can see now that it is an old woman with snake eyes… a dead old woman with snake eyes and peeling flesh. She is putrid and maggoty. She is coming right at us. She is my mother."

Lost

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I can't find my way back to the library. I've heard of this happening, that if you leave even for just one day and for a very good reason, as good a reason as mine, you may not find your way back. Now why should this be so? I do not understand this library. It houses…

The Polymath

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Now that I am dead, my god will fight your god...

Water Break

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Whenever you act as if you're one of themit makes perfectly sad sense tome; you are one of them; we're supposed to believe there areno shadows in that particular choice? When you areone of them, they say youfall asleep with a peaceful droopinglip to your smile. When…

Some Things You Never Forget

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Some things you never forget, especially if they are repeated frequently. I cannot hear her voice saying those words, now, I have forgotten its timber, its pitch, but I remember the words.

God's Vial

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The porous bear the anchorite’s vial

How To Write a Poem

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an EZ How to Guide in 50 simple steps