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a few of my favorite beacons of hope and tenderness

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life is a lucky thing, bountiful among the drugs and flowers

How to Have a Dinner Party

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sherbet is hard cash.

What 68 Years on Planet Earth Have Taught Me

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Life is not always quixotic.

THUNDERSNOW

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I know who done it. Them goddamn taters. I walked around the yard and started picking up pieces of the camaro, wondering if, from above, they’d laid the parts out into some kinda cult symbols or something.

The Nude Pianist: A Novel: Chapter 10

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Sounds terrific, but are there any strings attached?

Red Sky at Night

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Floating in liquor only to drown the next morning.

The Amber Sea

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There is no life here, only a bleak slab of frozen desert and a sorrowful wind that calls for me to venture out.

The Time Traveler

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My work is not that sexy and glamorous kind of time travel that you see in the movies with Deloreans and phone booths.

Blood on Her Hands

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Only blood I got on me was pulling him over onto my seat when I got out.

Boxes

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His voice isn't familiar but his words are. He says he knows we haven't spoken in years and apologizes for it. I can hear him pacing on the other end of the line, tapping things and then a shriek of glass shattering. Really, I tell him, no need to…

The Funeral

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Over the years, Morgana had grown. She was so much more than what Xavier remembered. So much different. She had an astute, almost shrewd air about her. She didn't seem nearly as fragile as he had left her. No, she had an eye out for herself now.…

Broken Vase

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Once was when we were in Vegas on layover from L.A., I told her I thought we should go to the Elvis Chapel and get remarried.

Imparting Shots

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He knows why I’m here, so he stalls, talking about the coffee, about how it’s a new dark blend from a little shop in The Village, about how he loves the flavor, so rich, but just because a coffee is dark doesn’t mean it’s stronger, that, in fact, it’s the

Wallflower

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It was one of those weekday mornings in early spring when Marjorie and I could wander from chapel to chapter house with only security guards for company.

Home Land

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At times we rarely desire to be where we are at home quite as much as we desire to be where we are no longer.

The Evacuation Queue

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The ticking must have gone on for an hour before Kathy realized it wasn't a clock. When the line finally moved, the rhythm changed. When the queue stopped again, she glanced behind her and noticed a woman in torn jeans and a filthy sweater tapping a heel on the…

Wanna Bet?

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I was always more comfortable with the ponies than you were / more comfortable with betting windows and two-dollar bills than you were

Women on Motorcycles

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Do you want this, you ask, and hand me a blue silk shirt of hers with small yellow flowers. I'm afraid to say no, in case it makes you remember all over again.

How Josh Met Emily

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“Well in opposite heaven every time you make scrambled eggs the shells break into a million pieces, then you spend eternity picking them out of the yolk.”

The Weather in Paradise

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I immediately felt anxious guilt, being the one responsible for opening the way for infection.

Letter to John Berryman

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My dad was an Army Reservist stationed in the U.S.—New York and Texas—the bugler in his corps. He golfed on summer weekends at Hazeltine in the course of his career. I had seen houses water colored prettily within the lines on L.S.D., after noticing not

Chalk (Sunflowers) on a Sidewalk

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Okay, so it's not exactly the lost art of sweeping anything away . For the sad fact that no one searing Love endures just for us. Brown, folded Petals, yellows buttered over petals, I do not Wait to see if the floating moon Can at…

The Arrow

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"Give it to me I said, you dip! Fork it over!"

Klonakilty

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Magdalena White Herrington praised the lucky stars who’d sent her the Klonakilty ghosts.

The Cracks Between My Keyboard Keys

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In exactly 100 words, I review the cracks between my keyboard keys.

Make Not Thy Head a Grave

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the emergence of the Beatles and the Vietnam War sad human electricity no buzz of any wheel

Chipmunk Song

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Chipmunk SongChipmunk workin' in the roadside weedsLookin' all around for nuts and seedsSmall bird callin' from a hickory treeAll's right with the world and all's right with meChipmunk searchin' for nuts and seedsLucky fellow finds all he needsAs for me all I desireIs a…

The Gentleman on the Train

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The gentleman is discreet, but his eyes wander from his paper at intervals as we travel together from London to Manchester. We happen to be on the same train and he happens to be sitting opposite me. I happen to be a size 34C.

Beer Pong With the Nobel Prize Winners

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Alcohol and American writers have always had a connection–about 70 percent of American winners of the Nobel Prize for Literature could be considered heavy drinkers if not more.

Fast

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Everything seems still, but it's not.