Most read stories

Whose Barney's Version is This, Anyway?

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Early reviews of Barney’s Version (the film) had prepared me for finding the book’s most amusing attributes – particularly its skewering of Quebec nationalist politics and Canadian cultural nationalism – left out. After all, turning a 417-page account of

Stephen King Stephen King

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In the early years, we never got tired of playing Stephen King. We played Stephen King at home and we played Stephen King in restaurants, shopping malls, airports, and hotels. We played Stephen King so much that we could have turned pro.

Arroyo Vista

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In some parts of town, people are not allowed to grow vegetables because of the plutonium used in the Lab. Three local parks were recently found to be contaminated.

The Impulse of Breathing

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She listens to the rhythm of the tide, each surge and surrender like the death of an old life and the resurrection of something new.

How to Travel with Your Demons (2)

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The love of hundreds of people, seemingly, rain down from the sky, but its not like when the cock hits the good spot inside you. And everybody who is reading this knows this is true. We all know what that feels like, that aha moment, that eiphany, like,

Charlie Brown’s Diary: Excerpts

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Snoopy flies in today. His goggles scratched, one ear torn and bleeding, but his eyes aglow.

The Philosophy of Charlie Parker

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If the sky is charcoal, it's laundry day. If it's cornflower blue, it's football in the empty square behind the school. If it's white like duck feathers, Hinckle Finckle will visit. If it's burnished gold, it's oscar wieners for dinner (we love oscar…

The seasons, it is said...

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.....

A Day in the Life of a Supermodel Armpit Makeup Artist

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“Skip the obsequies,” he said. He meant “flattery” but he’d been taking a “30 Days to a More Powerful Vocabulary” course.

Breaking Curfew (and Other Short Stories)

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Money’s tight

Dementia

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They should have shot me when I turned 80, a bullet right between my sunken eyes.

The Dummy's Guide to Marriage Proposals

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She first asked him to marry her when she was five, when 'marry me' meant 'I like you more than anybody else' and she loved everybody around her who was nice to her. And he was so very nice to her. …

Because

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Because I'm old and this is the Way I Do Things now...

She Closed Her Eyes

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So we pushed on. Beyond all reason. Avery still with the gun strapped over her shoulder, her close-cropped bangs, her small feet in army boots clodding through the open brown field we were now in. Above us, a wavering circle of vultures, following us, …

Mocking Bird

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There were always mocking birds around my house.

Pacific Light

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That was one option. Another was to assemble all the resident grunts...on one side of the island, jump up and down in unison, flip it over, and see if life on the bottom was any better.

Good Evening Ladies and Gentlemen

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My name is Mandy and I'll be your narrator today. I'd like to welcome you aboard. You will be reading at the approximate speed of one hundred words per minute. Total estimated reading time will be about fifteen minutes. At this time, I'd like to point out several of the…

His Name Was Do Re Mi

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I unzip him out of skin. Find what is dark and black inside. Mistake jutting spine for zipper grooves.

An Irish Seder

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The promise of free food and drink was too much to pass up since I hadn't played a gig in months and was living on peanut butter and celery. When Kelly called I was too hungry and thirsty for drink to turn him down.

Tattoos

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Boxing Gloves for when...

Ginger

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I didn't tell her how deeply a terrible weakness for ginger haired people ran in our family, how fortunes had been lost only because of a red beard, a freckled shoulder of exquisite paleness, or a pink nipple.

Dead Parental Units

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Each death a sonnet, every grief / fourteen lines.

I Wanted To Say That Your Hands Are Like Unfurling Leaves

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But I didn't sleep well and my dreams were full of octopi

Survivor

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The tubing unwound in her hands, unreeling like a garden hose... it wasn't always that easy...

The Hotel Where Esenin Hanged Himself

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I walk by the hotel where Esenin hanged himself.

Red Fox Rampant

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Shit, Marcie, I thought you were taking something. I mean you did say you were on the pill. I don’t want no screaming brat. Get rid of it.

Mother Tongue

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And when at night you stare at dark walls and one pair of lips comes closer, whispering in perfect German Ich bin deine Mutter -

Anatomy of a Breakdown

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Can’t seem to put your clothes on today. You’re wandering in the little closet of your mind again, picking at socks that won’t stay up, shirts that are always too big -

Europa

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The sink spat its water in a most erratic and vindictive fashion, with varying temperatures of discomfort and a nefariously mechanical nonchalance. Her arms are elbow deep in the misbehaving appliance, it looked to us as if she was drowning a small rodent

OWS Boston: Members Only

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Occupy Wall Street protestors in Boston complained that homeless people had taken coats, blankets and food donated to the fight against income inequality. “They don’t bring anything to the table,” said a spokesman at the information tent.