Most read stories

Quicksand

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At 25...

Owl, Glass, Deer

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He calls it an owl glass: he’s allowed: he’s six.

Need and Desire

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“I mean it, Hanna. I don't want you to.” But his leg felt carved away where her head had lain. One stupid thing jostling another for attention. He was afraid that if she touched him again, he'd have her on the ground.

Party w/Your Parents' Siblings

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Her mother sighed, fingering the faux-pearls around her neck. Barbara's neck tensed, almost as though the hair on the back of it would stand up: Here comes a platitude . . .

Larry's "Gonna Die" Parrtayye

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When we started plans for the party, none of us wanted Larry to die, most of all Larry himself. Actually, when we first started plans for the party, Larry wasn’t dying.

What We Know but Can’t Describe

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We know them just enough/ to recognize them when we find them.

Combinatorics

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“I'm thinking about math class,” she said. “The solution to three factorial.” “Easy,” Leo said.

Bloody Vodka

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Broken glass attacks me

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

Eyes Without a Face

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It's tough when muscle gets in the way of memory. The way pain is the only thing I can remember about certain things. Fifth grade, that's what I think of. I think of pain. Not just abstract pain, not some we'll get to it later adolescent angst or ennui.…

Estella

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Everyone loves a story of love unrequited. But what about the stories of the unrequited lovee?

Restaurant Rondo

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Before she flushes the toilet the world is spinning.

The End of Fun and Games

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A procession of our somber youth— stoned and stunned and broken beyond repair—viewed the boy carved of putty. The mortician painted him stuffed him, presented him to us, the semi-living.

Lives and their rivers

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The pristine Hudson's/waters dance in the dark of/the East River's rinse.

Girl With Glasses And Skinny Fingers

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Girl with glasses and skinny fingers playing with wires

Reversal

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For reasons he couldn't fathom, his motorcycle only moved in reverse. He engaged the engine and lurched backward hard. He called a friend, a gear-head with perpetually dirty nails, asked him to look it over.

The Grinder

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"For several days thinking they had found a dead man’s boot beside the highway..."

The Havisham Complex

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Zinvushka Zokolovskaya and I first met at the local botanical garden.

My Name is William Hurt and I Am a Movie Star

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Not to sound too ridiculous, but Hurt was giving me the hurt, and it felt good.

The Devil Line is a Violin (ELECTRIC DELIRIUM 1.1)

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Rosea plays a bohemian plainsong for the cosmonauts among us, while her fuzzy apple hips spit glitter, spin strobes: pink shades of pantyline flicker; lip-licked neon hues scrape strings in B sharp, a gloomy clue.

once upon a time in Sumeria (2)

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THE man in the tent with the stick points to the chart on the wall and says to us all: the stats point to the end of the war by the end of the fall. A just war, not just oil. Just then Allah's shadow comes over the scene. He's here to stiffen his troops with some …

Want

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I want you closeI want to feel youinside me,softening me untilmy borders are blurredand I'm hardly breathing,my heart swellingso big itbrings me to my knees,I want to know thepain of losing youeach time youclose your eyes andgo to sleep anddream of someone else,I want to…

THE RICH RIVER

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I must have been six years old at that time, but the events of…

An Unheeded Return

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On an over­cast and humid day in August, Jesus—with Dad’s per­mis­sion, of course—decided to make his grand return.

Taking A Walk

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13 rooks on a lifeless tree

A Christmas Story

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I pay for 3 Trump Troll Dolls and a package red licorice twizzlers and head back toward the door. Dancing Gnome Girl is there to greet me. I stick a twizzler in the teeth of the donation pail.

PARK

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Shadows from a star Never too close Never too far

Against Disorder

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It is true that the college dogs spread vermin, reeked and shat on the soccer field...

My Brain is a Pre-Historic Babe Magnet

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Ug seemed kinda down in the dumps so, uncharacteristically for a male hominid, I asked him why he looked so glum. “Ug no find nice girl,” he said, poking a stick in the dirt.

Meadows

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The whole thing is broken. It's like an egg. I'm not saying this to get you to say something else in the sunny opposite direction of the tattooed scar upon my painted backyard scene. I don't really care. It's only on me. Not on you. I'm glad as…