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,

From somewhere beneath the train, steam rose, which was—of course—puzzling as the train was powered by electricity. The steam condensed on the windows of the cars, making tears streak across the surface. Perhaps that was why the woman’s cheeks were shinin

Paulette lived on the east side on Paulette Avenue. Mama dropped me off when we wanted to play Barbies. Her neighborhood was a little green lily pad in a swamp of blight and disrepair. A ghetto moat ringed around those three fancy blocks like a first line of defense,…

saw the world was a mess I did nothing about it, poured myself some apple juice

I took a lover on Ibiza either because he was clean-smelling or because he had a hotel room and there were none to be had.

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

Doofus National Puppet Radio Total Bogascity Sex Cowards Mein Kampfire Boner Hyperventilate Sewer Video Rats Psychic Umbrella Fire Your Psychic! Tender Brisket Megatrouser Puzzlement University Housecoats Fuchsia Big Ass Dawn

The clarinet and the accordion are brothers, I see. Big, fat men with curly, klezmer hair.

The TV projects from an insect arm. It has the face of my ex-husband, smiling and void. I like to set small fires and inhale them.

Can we survive our Y chromosome?

Mayumi could see as far as her eyes could, all the buildings hugged by the trees. Roads stretching outward as if reaching for something far away.

Her fever spreads through lines of a plaid mini, over burnt milk, darkened to yellow. Fingers explore fabric folds up and into the lost dimensions of logic.

the sound of ashes/ being poured in the kitchen

She picked the fish out of the box leaving a pool of mucus and blood slowly congealing on the shelf and dripped it toward the kitchen table. Outside the wind lashed the tops of the poplar trees together and rain sprayed from the barn roof opposite.

We are insatiable