1663 2 2
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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…
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166367
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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.
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166300
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In the grip of a bad dream, she bolted awake, thinking she had heard the nightsounds of a tomcat crawling around her property.
It was some dreaded hour before dawn; she had no idea when. Her small, frail body was stiff, her breasts swollen and sore to
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166392
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Public Wi-Fi ”hotspots” allow men and women to ogle each other discreetly while pretending to write the Great American Novel.
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1663117
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No bustling inside
No extruded amber
Wings onyx straight jackets
A low hum of displeasure.
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16631112
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Tunnel hobos, all hootched up high, think a sign's all about super powers, mind reading, clairvoyance, dig?
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166200
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“Imagine a Shakespearean scholar coming upon an undiscovered work by the Bard. That’s how thrilling this is."
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166200
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“Jesus Christ!” the man screams in pain, and a chorus of “Ewww” is heard from the girls' bench, where the severed body part has landed in a Yoplait strawberry yogurt.
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166274
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God damn you women get me all /
twisted up thinking oohrahrah and lala
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166241
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The little girl spooned strawberry yogurt into her mouth as a pleasant morning breeze swept across the balcony of the hotel. The girl lifted the cup and stuck her tongue inside to lick the yogurt off the edges. Across the small round table, the girl's mother sat…
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166240
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She wanted wolf cubs. Not kittens, not husky pups given as infant gifts with red bows around their scraggy necks. No, she wanted wolf cubs. Even when it grew to pace the length of her hallway - proud as men - she could not love it. …
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166222
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166265
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When I got to Pete's house he was sitting on the curb smoking a cigarette, bruised and dirty, with a smoking pile of rubble behind him where his house used to be. I hadn't heard yet, but his ol' girl left him and blew up the house when she left.
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1662118
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Me and Dale chuck rocks at it.
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16621711
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maybe a day in deep winter
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16611211
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and watch the bird play and squirrel play/
and the twitching of cottontail noses
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166110
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Darrell and I pulled into my driveway after being out all night long. A slash of sunlight fell across the purple Mexican sage beside my front walk. Except for the birds in the trees, there seemed to be an odd serenity to the air — until I spotted one
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16611611
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What a beautiful Thing / Urine is
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16612312
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The skin will stay but you won’t see it,/
camouflaged by creases, tags, and curious/
deposits of renegade fat and pigment.
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166100
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Scott was sure his father was reassured by the sticky stains in his Penthouse; Dad found them when Scott was thirteen. Dad had just one issue of that venerable porno, which Scott defiled with his joy. It was not the Penthouse models…
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166140
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That Loving Feeling
How do I love thee?
I love the bulge
of your breast
along the inside
of my upper arm
when you lie on top
kissing me
I love
feeling the movement
of your nipple
along the tender skin
there
It
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166144
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The figure eight will fall on its side. Become infinity.
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16614128
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She pulled into the doorway. Uncertain where to spend the night. Certain there'd once been a place with food. Here. This place. She remembered. Curtains. Small tables. Coffee cups thick-handled and sturdy. Crockery.
Some words came back.
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166100
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They screened the thousands of mosquitoes that hatched, and found a few carrying the botox transgene. In a few months time, several billion mosquitoes had been bred, ready for release. Now to wait for that diplomatic flashpoint, when war could be declared
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166110
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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
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166170
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On the way to the drinking fountain, Elysia Martin, a third grader at St. Michael's Parochial School, heard a voice calling her name. When she turned toward the white plaster statue of the Virgin Mary that sat between twin hedges in the rose garden, she
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166111
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Puddles—not his real name, as you’ve probably gathered, but the kind of nickname a fat kid got tagged with in our neighborhood—kept stopping short, picking underwear out of his ass or taking a breather. This had the unfortunate byproduct of my crashing in
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166143
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Prabo was late.
It wasn’t like him, I thought, sitting on the steps of the Galle Face Hotel, the Indian Ocean pounding the beach abutting the nearby Galle Face Green and spraying fine mist everywhere. Or at least it didn’t seem like him.
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166144
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When I got that brain tumor I hallucinated this crazy doctor. Dr. Doug. He came into my…
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166132
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Her students read their work aloud in class, haltingly, sometimes proudly, and their willingness amazed Miriam. They were immigrants and retirees, carpenters, security guards, Indian nannies, Iranian escapees. She loved their odd word choices, the lack of editorial impulse.…
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