Most read stories

You Don't Have to Read This

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I get it. Poetry is an effort. Language is an effort. Words are an effort. Reading words is an effort. A big effort. It takes energy. Attention. Focus. Who has that? Nobody. So truly. I mean it. You don't have to read this. If you're already reading this you can…

Am I Anna Karenina?

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You’re often photographed at Martha’s Vineyard at sunrise, Key West on New Year’s Day, Coney Island on Christmas, and variously at dive bars in Montauk. You’re a woman of a certain age and you are also a woman of the world. You’re a 21st century

Boba Fett Blues

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So you want to know my earliest realization that I was just another boob consumer? Trace it back to my Star Wars Action figure days. Fish out the collapsible C3PO from a war-torn pile of crummy Jawas and Storm Troopers, no they're all out of Snaggletooth

Flaubert Eats Breakfast with His Mom

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your mania for sentences / has dried up your heart

Black Squirrel Poem

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disorderly black squirrels / inhabit upper Michigan

Nonesuch

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The morning of her suicide, Nonny Rice received a letter.

Athena 2.0

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The story goes that the night before I was born my dad had a terrible headache.

An MFA Creative Writing Essay Question

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7. Using Cohen's Method of Structure craft a piece of fiction featuring unexpected conflict. (12 points)

On the Way to Your First AA Meeting

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The memory of thinking in some other language

Love

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Trent’s had many phases: Madonna, Bette, leather, water sports, rollerblading, haiku, chicken queen, rice queen, muscle queen, daddy. But religion? This is new.

Missy

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If I had a daughter, this it how it would be. It would be all, Stand up straight, missy, shoulders back, no slouching, and she'd be sulky, sullen, pouting, wilful, and I'd see in her eyes, which would be my eyes, that she was starting to hate me, and I'd

My Other Mother is a Ferrari

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******WARNING: Long-ass story****** Click at your own risk.

The Bob Delusion

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It couldn’t be a worse time for failed novelist Robert Grayson. He’s 40 and falling apart. He’s balding and accumulating a gut. His job writing technical manuals for software looks like it might get cut. Then his wife does the unthinkable and files

Sketches for My Sweetheart the Drunk

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A portrait of my sweetheart drawn while she is asleep: a passed-out angel illuminated by the light of dawn coming in from the bathroom window, one of her shoes missing.

A Beautiful Ancient Ghostly Passionate Spirit of the Stars

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Fabio has a soul of passion. A beautiful soul of passion. His passionate soul was so beautiful the ancient stars shone upon him and made him look like ghosts at night.

Fascination

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It rained on the morning of the party, and the weatherman promised it would continue throughout the day. But Marilyn didn't mind. She actually preferred entertaining in bad weather. Her rugs weren't valuable enough to worry about, and the gloomier the sky

The Dog by the River

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I am seven years old today and I want the dog by the river, the one with the great mane of hair like my father's who is a singer at night, and with big ears, too, that grow from the top of its head so that I can tug on them if it's being bad or stroke them…

(1) Nan

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[Her adviser] looked at her and tilted his head, smiling. Over his shoulder she saw the M104 bus cruising up Broadway, and considered diving under it. Instead she took off toward the corner, in shame, and he followed. When they parted ways, he took her ha

Eleutheria

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She watched an inky cloud suck all the color / from the trees.

The Longfellow Bridge Diaries: Part 2

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They sway from his hips, the torn knapsack, and the corners of the pushcart

Ain't Comin' Back

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He told of the wilting heat, the fulgent landscape, the people....

Comfort of Friends

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She drove me to radiation, to acupuncture and support group. She brewed me concoctions that smelled of twigs and dirt...

The Egg Whisk

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A plain oval face, opaque except for a birthmark streaking the right cheek like chicken shit.

Arcana Magi - c.3: Five Months Later...

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Oryn’s eyes opened wide as her smile removed the sadness. She stood in awe with what she saw, as the sound of footsteps drew closer to her.

After Bukowski

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The night she left she claimed she fucked Bukowski.

Intolerable Impositions

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"She gnawed her arm off in the morning, before he woke...."

Death's Noisy Herald

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Lying there, with the terrible screech emanating from his chest, blaring from his open mouth, he thinks about jet planes and jack hammers and nuclear explosions. He doesn't have quiet thoughts.

Peggy Guggenheim Visits her Favorite Question

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Q: “How many husbands have you had, Mrs. Guggenheim?” A: “D’you mean my own, or other people’s?”

Before the Door

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You just can’t believe your key / won’t open the front door anymore.

Women Making Love to Monsters

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I started dating the Minotaur because of Colleen; at the time she was going with a friend of his. The whole thing was a surprise to me because I'd never been attracted to Greek men. This is how it happened. Colleen's new guy, Ian, was known by many…