Most read stories

Deception

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Distance.

mourning

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The moment I was told of your passing...

Summer, 1966

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After my mother died, my father shipped me to my uncle's. He hadn't told me she was dying, so he could just mourn alone.Lena lived next door, Italian, my age -- which was ten -- beautiful. She was watched by goons in black suits. Her parents owned a restaurant. Across the…

Lastborn

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Being the baby in a family forces a focused outlook on life. Not necessarily profound, not even wry, but a perspective that pushes for two things - recognition, and to be in on whatever is going on.

Laughing at Ants

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It IS good, right?

Doing Time Outside (novel excerpt)

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If you are a family member or friend of a person incarcerated in a correctional facility...

How to Pass among Mortals

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Take no form or face beautiful enough to cause warfare, or that which would provoke inanimate objects to song. If a tree wishes to flower in your presence, request that this happen very slowly.

Born in 1991

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Sometimes I think living in a house with so many rooms / you can get lost just making your way to the fridge / should be enough. I chastise myself for wanting more.

Hammered then hungover

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When she got back to Claire's, she was hammered and she had no idea what time it was, what day, or, frankly, what planet. It was the first time she'd been that drunk in years. The last time she could remember getting even close to that wasted was at a Christmas party right…

Chancing the Moonglow

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It's become sort of a habit now when Elsie's husband is away on business two or three times a month that we take the afternoon off and drive nine miles across the river to Marginalia, Arkansas and the Moonglow Motel with its red, neon vacancy sign and although to some, two…

Trade-Offs

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Smiling, holding hands, Joe and Lara basked in the sunshine of the mid January day as they approached the diner. The temperature was warm enough for golf. Joe had played in far colder weather in spring and fall.

The Commodore

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The commodore drives a 67 Caddy rag top All fin and boatish power

Wait

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I'm not dying. What is it called if you think you might have Hypochondria but you really don't? I'm worried that's what I have. Is it cold in here? Or is it me, dying?

The Death of Sherwood Anderson

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like the Bible in / Mauritania, like a mouse in a vial of ammonia, / like a retired coal miner on vacation in the Alps

Losing It

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The following is a true story, or rather it is a true experience from the story of my life. Some say that just because something happens doesn't really make it "true".

On Desire

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For two days his parents had been fighting, and they would tell him to tell the other one something every morning that was supposed to be some sort of slight at their personal failings, which had been inflamed by their twenty years of marriage.

The Weight of a Gun

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The first time I ever held a gun, I was three years old...

Luminous Nights, 5

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It turned out that my brother's newly acquired building in downtown Pasadena, was what developers called a "see-through" building. That meant you could look from one side of the building all the way through to the other side, without obstruction. In oth

The Writer and the Talker

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"I’ve always wanted to write a novel. Like Catch-22, something off-beat that would start by word-of-mouth, you know, and become an underground classic."

The Snake Pit

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They come in my room without knocking and I'm nekkid.

Possum

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A possum sits on a fence. The fence is downtown in a not-very-big town. Hard to say about possums and fences; this is not the first possum to sit on a fence. Once, during a suburban backyard party a possum sat on a fence and observed. Before long he could walk more…

SWING-SET

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Soon, out of the womb ‘down there' is nuance. It guides you, like a legality, like your own breathing, in and out of overtone, hardcore hodgepodges, those inklings near sacrosanct beyond breakfront negligees and neo-negligence leading the good life. Isn't it…

Taikutsuna, Abburido, Boring

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A Beatles haircut and loose Khaki painters overalls rendered the child sexless. He or she walked over to Hugh’s side and standing tiptoe peered into the casket. She, for Hugh had determined it was a girl, stroked the silk lining.

November Odds

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The stars align against us. Lines of force/ collaborate to push us off the edge/ into the dark abyss we’ve joked about.

There's A Place I Know

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“Reminds me of my safari in Africa. Somebody forgot the corkscrew and for several days we had to live on nothing but food and water."- W.C. Fields Around the next corner is a dark green door a dark…

Gipetto's Sin

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The boy grew frightened when his grainy wooden skin began to melt, every fiber humming and softening.

An Open Letter For Zombie Rights

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We are what we are, and that is zombies.

The Swans

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The struggling creature opened its beak and let out a shrill cry before both parents moved in and, using their webbed feet, forced its head back under the surface.

Assiduity Fourteen

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Don reports everything to Uzma and Rasheed, I'm aware of that. It doesn't bother me. I'm not hiding anything from them or anyone else.

Man and Dirt

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Wherever you decide to grow Please remember to ask the dirt ‘Am I still dust’