1458 6 2
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Mark dressed the velvet red Stetson,
too big for his head,
like a dandy.
A six year old savior
with fringe on his pockets
flapping as he, the ‘Judas horse’
led me ’round back
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145854
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145821
|
This was before the cancer, years before. He did this every day: up at five, before Astrid and Max. Four cups of coffee in the machine. A bowl of granola. Five hundred words. Five hundred words no matter goddamn what. Five hundred words on Sunday and Chri
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145833
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A small bar of glycerin soap floated in the sink full of bloody water . . .
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145887
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I was at Mike's place when the call came. My brother sounded so accusing that I wanted to punch him in the face. But he was way upstate. "Dad died today," he said, as if I could have somehow known or prevented it. It was sudden. A heart attack. He was…
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145842
|
One summer night, as I walked alone down the cracked sidewalk of Kentucky underneath a canopy of maples where the moonlight fell through branches and lit my path with uneven lines I wondered: where does the residue of lust and desire go when everything you want to…
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145822
|
Sit back n enjoy the show in a puffy puffed-up chair
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145700
|
Mayumi and her friends arrived at the beach. The sun was near setting for the night, and a few stars began an early peek in the twilit sky.
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145745
|
. . . it's all we ever want -- the holding.
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145730
|
You see the ocean for the first time on our honeymoon. Your large feet dig deep into the muddy sands of the Maryland coastline as your blue eyes swell at the infinite water before you. I wrap my…
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145782
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Mom wraps a bulky-knit scarf around my face and over my mouth. She tightens it into a big knot in back of my collar.
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145754
|
We were wild, medieval magpies,
sweaty and sweet and selfish; and so much more
than we were before I lit that first stick of spice,
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145700
|
I had enough judgment, anger and vengefulness from the people around me in the steel town of Pueblo, Colorado, where I was growing up. I didn’t need more from my God.
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1457126
|
Every morning, Wilma's husband Richard would cross the street and visit with a neighbor, always after the neighbor's husband left for work. Wilma was a loner, never bothered with neighbors. She enjoyed sitting on her patio in her lounge chair,…
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145751
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Two summers later, the ritual began. Carol left her house at midnight, having served her husband and daughter a heavy dinner that left them caged in their sleep. She was like a thief working in reverse: she rose from bed with her husband’s first snore,
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145731
|
It was cloudy, the way he liked it -- no baking in the sun. People passed occasionally. He sniffed at the joggers, “Health Nuts,” he dubbed them. He hadn’t exercised since his last high school gym class.
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145743
|
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1457159
|
We liked the orderly Newtonian/
with its fundamentalist action/
and reaction, its rules
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145700
|
Only early June, but the heat feels like August. Eleanor and Shelby sit on the front steps of the old Victorian-style house in downtown Los Angeles, drinking homemade margaritas and watching the daylight drain away to dusk. Shelby slaps a mosquito away fr
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145685
|
Not believing enough in God he was made unfortunate. Neither cursed nor damned; merely little things. Missing rides, running out of toilet paper, showing up late. Until, suspecting someone he had overlooked, he chose a God. The wrong One it transpired. Things…
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145620
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The sighs of the nearby shore came to me through an open window.Wave after gentle wave caressed her broad, sand crusted skin. Mesmerized, I lay still.The in out sound of breathing now filled the room.Your warmth enveloping me like the satin…
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1456125
|
I walked along the beach today, and there I saw them all; including the latest lost: little Tiven, Tommy, Michaela & my Paul. Grandma painted at her easel, set upon the dune. Uncle Eddie bent in half, laughing like a loon, Oliver growled…
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145643
|
The snow buzzes in the Ritalin air beneath Dairy Queen clouds
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145610
|
Even when the sun is gone and things get dark, usually the moon comes to reflect some light of hope until a new dawn can emerge
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145696
|
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145633
|
Her body: normal as a body, a baby’s body: skin and eyes.
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145695
|
The instant you remember
gratitude
with enough focus to spring free its power...
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145622
|
“You own your own burial plot, but you don't own your home,” he'd said, and I couldn't help but agree.
|
145697
|
MOSAIC Your eyes coal-rimmed, busted, burned by betrayal. You and I, knee to knuckle, skinny with disorders and blurred around our edges. Challenged by our experience and the ash of past-love dusting the grate, the state, the…
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145511
|
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.
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