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Old Houses

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The rocking chair will bite your toes.

Moi et Stendhal's Lust for Women's Eyebrows

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“Oh yeah?" I said to Stendhal. "I found six references to women's eyebrows in Travels in the South of France. That's all you think about!”

Against the Wall

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happily fling Molotov cocktails// against ICE agents in armored vehicles/ and sing the pain of their burning deaths/ as triumph against asininity.

Otillie

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Shhh. I am here. Otillie Augustine, from Trieste, an Italian city to you, but when I lived it was part of Austria. Such things as who flies their flags over a city? Not so important after all, after all the losses and the victory speeches. These were not…

His Essay on the Meaning of Poetry

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Poetry is conceit; emotional, intellectual or technical.

Meet Cute

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This had the unintentional effect of me picturing her in a tight white top and tiny orange shorts. From up close like this, I had clearly misjudged her earlier. She could definitely be more than the quirky best friend in my movie.

Questions of Ownership

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Who owns the moon? What title search/ could ever make a claim?

Professional Pizza Patter

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We all stared, somewhat shocked and mostly disgusted.

Exceeded

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I am exceeded / by a leaf

James Dean

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The woman lit a cigarette and sat on the edge of the bed, crossing one leg over the other. She took a long drag, tilted her head back, paused. Her eyes flicked to the NO…

Man Writing Story With Ears Plugged About Painter Who Only Hears in Color; Black Ink, 2002

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Ready, here we go.

Unspoken

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I'm waiting for your voice. My trembling hand is so damp the phone could slip from my fragile grasp at any moment. Each ring burns in my ear and makes the washing machine in my stomach tumble faster and faster. After three rings, or it could be four, or forty, I hear…

Intractable

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~ ! ~

Feeling fences

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... he could feel the pointed picket spears.

Perdition

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Colton nods, without words, understanding the significance of every word that the Old Man has uttered, knowing that in the end, given enough time, we all go down that lonely corner, to embrace the darkness, wishing to be cured of our sentiments.

Regarding Hank

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Won't speak a word against 'em. Car trunk stunk like bad chicken long after, but I won't speak a word against 'em.

Solid

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Explanation within

Ten Books That Have Stuck with Me Off the Top of My Head as I Make Them Up, #2

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#2 The Typewriter Inside You by Harmon Gentle—I found this one at a garage sale when I was 15. Intended as a manual for sharpening one's typing skills, by the third chapter it became obvious that Mr. Gentle's sanity had slipped, and that rather than mastering the…

Balm (excerpt)

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my second language / to silence / plainsong of / the breast

Jenny Whistled Through The Mail Slot

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We all thought, Birds! We all thought, Nests inside the chimney!

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…

Those Brain Motility Blues

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Philosophy: a muscular exercise of throat, jaw, tongue, and brain.

Story by Committee

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The past has no flavor.

Paint-Can Harry Lets in Some Much Needed Air

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Welcome the one and the all of you, welcome all you scraggly long haired weeds, welcome the no longer rolling stones of the new you, welcome you most beautiful little wonderfully…

on the shore on the shore

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I await, here at Sandymount Strand / There's a stony bed and moistened sand / Couples dance away into futurity / With their dogs upon the shore

Arcana Magi Zero + Pure - c.7

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Keiko covered her arm while holding the staff. She looked up and saw morning breaking through the sky, but something was unusual about it.

Five Evangelists

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Five evangelists in bathing suits baptize a man while green chilies roast on a Ferris wheel rotisserie

Fictionaut or Not? Write On.

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Okay, I'm here; I'm participating. Enjoying the back & forth with other writers. Waiting for penises and fetuses to move down the "Most Recent" list, but working around them. Well, that's kind of unintentionally visual.This essay, like many other reads on here, is…

Winter Paints Nelson County

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It was more than just taste/ more than a point of view/ and oil and pigment/ that painted a store front church/ a box with a cross in a vacant lot/ that welcomed desperation, faith/ and imagination.

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