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Prayer

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Prayer

Satellite Dish (from The New Yorker)

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Just as one thing I say is “Don’t worry about me,” one thing I think is that you love somebody by living with them...

Farm

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Still as the knife on the counter there still. Like mothballs in a chest. One with clear bags and newspaper clippings and your scarf inside it. The baby girl could put a mothball in her mouth and suck it like a penny. The way too close to a light bulb bur

Kanha's Dream

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"Look at the grime on those curtains. Not fit for an Emperor. Pull them down. Put up fresh new ones. Not a spot." "Oh! Look at this throne. All uneven legs. The gems are not shining. The gold looks dull. Fix it, fix it, fix it!"

The Nude Pianist: A Novel: Chapter 37

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—Frank, how is your sex life?

The Painter, the Actor, the Piano Player

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1.As fast as that I wake to astonishing desire. I'd met you at my parents' house just the weekend before but for them (them the drained students trying to relax, refill before their afternoon sessions) you are the stranger in the room,…

Wishing for the Shadow of a Perfect Cube

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Words darken with smut and irony over time.

Free

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The print is not ideal, it's true.

When Hadrons Collide

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When hadrons collide they’re not always Swiss. They may be cheese or neutral but that isn’t of my concern. Look at them, touch them, feel them, the quirks of the antiquarks, masonic mesons, baron baryon.

Chapter Two: Oracle

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The first thing I saw was a sandal, but it didn't exactly look priestly. It was golden and glowing, and the foot it was strapped to had red painted nails. The straps wrapped around her ankles, and up her slender leg, tied off in a bow below the knee.

she has one of those names that only a southern girl could pull off

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“But I don't HAVE an accent,” she said. With an accent. “Tell him I don't have an accent, y'all.” Looking from one friend to another. Messy ponytail bouncing. I just stared. I may have blinked. A couple times. Every syllable…

Tourists

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someone left graffiti on the billboard over: "God's a hard act to follow"; the one that made the news

Mutterings

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That old woman's got to be senile or something. The other day she asked my daughter if I had a "thing about water." Sharon told her I didn't, but then came right in and asked me, "Mother, you got a thing about water?"

The Celebrity

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Mr. Blumberg and I sat side by side on a small couch in the family room. He was watching a football game on TV.

Drug Series # 19: Heroin

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Billie Holiday and I want a cup of coffee and they tell us to go fuck ourselves.

Cat On A Hot Tin Roof

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Cat's ass was on fire. The roof was scorching hot. Her clothes were in a pile by the door that led to the roof. She was sitting next to the ventilation duct, her hands outstretched behind her, her knees bent before her. Jim was standing in front of…

Ballpoint Sketches for Banana Peel Poems

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I wanna make banana peel poems-- slippery little booby traps

Geneviève's Voice

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Maybe this very short story is about shyness. Maybe. I'm not sure.

Tin Girl

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Like some beautiful yet macabre puppet, she was suspended on strings of wire, painstakingly threaded tubing flowing into her cavities, through her chambers, around her mechanics.

Googling A Ghost

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My buddy had been in the computer business, a systems analyst. Surely there would be some mention of him online. But there was nothing. Nothing, that is, until I saw the obituary.

The Mojave Desert Remembers Ron Paul

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The Mojave Desert remembers Ron Paul With tattered billboards Scraped and clawed by vehement dust

A Look In the Mirror

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...That flash of horror as well as the lie that replaced it were mirrors of sorts and both told the truth.

Wrinkles, Men and Shades of Gray

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You stand in the mirror. You see yourself. You stand sideways; your profile is always your best. You tuck in your stomach, you stick out your ass but it's the same. You stand face front. You shiver. The mirror adds weight to your already sagging breasts, the wrinkles…

Beside Dripping Glaciers

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We slept beside dripping glaciers people like us We were never meant to be housed contained, kept, petted, cleaned We could only be gutted You used us one time and threw us out people like us We sprouted the wings of desire by watchi

Unfinished Business

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The receipts all fell into the black leather valise he’d retrieved from storage that afternoon, except for the forty-eight cents, which wound up in the right front pocket of his jeans.

Assiduity Three

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Everybody needs a flaw or two. It builds character.

Inconsequential

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I write poems as if language matters.

Still Life (55 words)

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It wasn't so much the softness of the bed that kept her from sleep, or the pungent bleach-scent of the unfamiliar sheets, but the lack of her clock's familiar tick, tick, tick. Or was it a missing heartbeat? Awake, she watched his chest. On the table, an empty pill …

Rwanda Suite: Gasoline

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I realize the kid is still smoking. Shocked, I tear the cigarette from his mouth, throw it to the earth, and grind it to death with the heel of my boot.

A World of Hurt

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Cat fight. I rush outside and swinging my trusty broom I charge the rolling yowling ball of black fur.