beatings and tear gas

Going to the candy store at night in the section of town called Kalliope. Riding bike, trying to get there before it closed at ten. Getting candy at that little store with the glass containers and the rows and rows of candy. Getting milk there…

No jagged bits of crust were thrust up/ through the prairie’s black gumbo/ to give us cataclysmic mountain views.

After years of unsustainable binge spending and a global economic semi-meltdown, most people have had to cut back on their expenses. Many folks are struggling to make do in this new and bewildering economy and we are all learning to live on our means, rather than beyond…

At 7:30 that evening my brother knocked on Parker's front door. When I went to let him in, sweat was running off Darrell's head like he'd been hit by a water balloon. The air was absolutely unmoving, and there was the smell of tar from the asphalt in th

A small bar of glycerin soap floated in the sink full of bloody water . . .

In your mouth is the attic studio Where your father’s brushes lie wet with water

Sleep never fades away quickly. It has to be shaken off, layer by layer, before reality can reach you. That is the way every morning works for me. There are some days when I will sit at the edge of my bed for almost an hour, shedding remnants of dreams

I guess you’re gone now That’s okay I guess I can live with my own ghosts I had no idea What it meant But now I do It meant I was standing At the end of everything And did not know it

Third time that day, he was on me. On me like bees to a flower (or flies on shit, he'd correct me, no doubt). Sucking sweet nectar and breathing that breath — damn that breath — 'round my head, in my ear, pestering, bugging, like a bee he annoyed me. B

He was just walking along, making sure that no white, Hispanic, Native American or Asian people were doing anything illegal when he noticed the young black man walking down the street. He hadn't meant to.

As black as his socks with a hole in them she used to sew while watching. The octopus has three hearts you know. Yes, No and Maybe. As black as inkpots, inkjets, as black as typewriter ribbons and the Gutenberg press, as black as the ink of a trillion

"Penning a slight of tongue well versed or worse, a salacious lie..."

The story itself is not much longer than a snippet. What is a snippet anyway?

Bill texted me at 3:44, invited me to join him at Chip's, where he was having a drink. Chip's Bar is a great dive, and I accepted without hesitation. Ten minutes later I was on a crowded bus filled mostly with fat people, and twenty minutes after that I was…