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Raft and Rag

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A new philosophy stirs in its surgery.

Ornithology

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Harpo was there with his wife. Harpo’s girlfriend came up behind the couch where I was sitting, and I ran my hand up her leg underneath her dress.

Hello and Thank You!

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She didn’t think of herself as an undesirable, no, she didn’t, but did find herself cowering in face of the presumed judgment of those around her. They had more money, more clout, more everything.

Hey Old Lady! Want To Buy A Reverse Mortgage?

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Facebook just hit me with an ad for coping with memory loss, probably because I just turned 63. As far as my favorite social media site is concerned, I am now an Old Lady. When I asked my Facebook pals who are also Seniors what kind of promotions have been turning up…

1992, What I Wanted

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To be a backup dancer for Billy Ocean; that's all. I had chubby legs like a baby. They turned out akwardly as if I had broken hips but mum said it was just the way I came out and I would grow out of it.

Rinds

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I miss Mother gentling the small of my back. She has forgotten me. Her little girl. Whose thumb she fussed over when a rose thorn scratched it and blood spilled like a secret. Whose smile she said was her morning sunshine, whose hug was incense. I yearn for her lips…

The Bombs & Blood of Texas & Boston

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Running into the fire, the smoke and the chaos; selfless first responders, innocent bystanders, and dedicated runners

The Canoeist's Luncheon. Renoir

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The artist leans back in his chair, smoking a cigarette after lunch, looking away from the table toward the right He is dressed in white, and he's practically stretched out his entire length, to relax after rowing the boat all morning. Sunlight

The Small Blue House

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She allowed him to wash her hair. Touching it in a wet state, running his hands through it in a soapy state, wringing the water out when he was finished—he was ecstatic.

1958-1961

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In those years, you and I were told to leap for a world suffused with sound and industry.

The Secret of Belief

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I don't believe in symbols but there's a hole in my living room window in the shape of a bird

"The Misses Moses," from my collection Aliens in the Prime of Their Lives (Norton 2010)

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The Misses Moses by Brad Watson from Aliens in the Prime of Their Lives The Moses sisters lived together, alone, in the fine old brick house near downtown where they…

High Jinks

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“Gorgonzolla!” The remnant croaked, his eyes wild as he thrust an open hand in Jaffron's direction. A burst of energy tilted Jaffron's pod on its axis and sent it hurtling backwards...

Sacrifice

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The church building was a rustic structure made of rough-cut lumber that over-lapped in the clap-board fashion. The building itself was unpainted, but the boards were a weathered gray that only came from years of exposure to weather. The steeple towered o

Mariposa

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He would not take Prozac and talked Jesus to her as if from a bucket.

don't let the flames chase you away

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my maddening pyromaniac,/ you're burning up my heart/ so open up your broad-toothed mouth/ and let me pour the ashes in.

Only Temporary

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It was the middle of May when I found out my teacher was screwing my mother.

Sometimes, an audience of one is enough

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not of time, but of all the clocks/ that tick along toward the end/ of all the possibilities.

Naked Launch

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I enjoy launching words into space. Please dangle a moment here while I prepare the next sentence. Ok. You can come in now. Take boiling for instance. And hawsers. The sound of words on a sheet of paper. The manifesto for a roll of sleep. Sleep is oblivious to…

Decades

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Every ten days, the Decadent Sisters assembled for dinner. Although raised together, they were each very different...

The Star... an excerpt from The Exile of Gaspar

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The night is very clear and unusually cold. We are so near to the star that its light banishes the darkness that tries futilely to extinguish it. A small village twinkles in the foothills to our east. The cry of a lost sheep cuts the night like a blade

Zorro

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Zorro lived in his mother’s basement until he could get back on his feet.

Relics

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Theresa Esposito woke to the smell of pignoli cookies baking. The sweet scent made her stomach rumble. She was ten-years-old today. And she felt ten. Her hair, her ears, her eyes, her toes — everything felt ten.

Oh, Baby!

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One of the drunk men, a dear friend, hunk, as he updated me, now living the existence of a poet, called from San Francisco to say he would take the plane to Minneapolis, do it, then leave me to raise the baby.

Forbidden Fruit

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After my vasectomy, I got a T-shirt with a picture of an orange on it. It said "All Juice, No Seeds."

This Can't Be Blank

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I don't know where to start. We're gaining flight. Did you seeanybody we know? The trees are always a concern. I don't thinkI know how to stop this thing from crashing into parked cars,that is if we live. You can say it was all on a stupid dare. They don't have to know…

Wire

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“We know you’re in there, motherfucker. Step out, slowly, and we might keep you fit for an open casket funeral."

Shim

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better than being dead

Raymond Chandler and His Wife

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One day it was boring / to be alive.

Joking

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I don't care much for Joking, which is not to say that I don't care at all for Joking, just that I don't care much. I would say, if I had to say, that I care for Joking about as much as I care for a cousin, not a close cousin, one I have a genuine frien