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White Room

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A white room is empty but for you, a card table and a chair.

I Dated A 50 Foot Woman

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There was no need to drive. She could travel ten miles in ten minutes. She merely had to be careful not to step on any cars or trucks.

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…

Sleeping late in Cahuita, Costa Rica

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The light of day is screaming, shook by the calls of howler monkeys, their low roar hanging in the salt, in the black sand riding the wind, as Playa Negra outstretches its infinite arms.

Those Things

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For me, it was that kind of moment. I got to come back. I had been here before and now, well now, I could come back. I had a chance to do it all again, bigger, better and well, just better. I hoped I could remember all that I learned the first time.

Snow

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She talks about window treatments, how the place is maybe too much for one. Wants me to know she’s not much of a cook, and wants me to smell what’s in her oven and compliment her cooking anyway.

MOTHER MOUSE AND HER BRATS

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Oh, you aren't going to lecture us, for heaven's sake?

Mommy

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I miss her.

Death by Dinner

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I can't believe it's Frankie, but there he is at a table on the far side, just in front of the big picture window. I hold the menu close to my face and peek again over the top, watching as he reaches under the white linen tablecloth to plant…

As Anti-Vegan Bias Spreads, SaladShooters Fight Back

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The Vegan Defense League is a vigilante group formed to fill the gap left by local law enforcement, who jam the parking lot a mile down the road at a donut shop. “By the time the cops finish their coffee and chocolate frosted donuts, we could be dead.”

Bearded Lady

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Nights this husband returned home still hungry sometimes, even for her forearms against his own

Mon in the forest: a fragment

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Mon wakes up surrounded by trees. The light is grey, the trunks black.How long have I slept? he wonders.He doesn't know which way to walk. In every direction, the same prospect of trees. He looks up at a blank sky. No sign even of the sun.***He starts walking. Slowly,…

Heron

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. . . nor did mine eye apologize.

Feeling fences

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... he could feel the pointed picket spears.

Herd

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We may think about so many things and thoughts about rain. We may think about where it is going, where it comes from.

Hey Hey It's Okay

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Over by the swimming pool singing - Hey hey it’s okay - A line from a song he heard - On the stereo when we were driving in the car - On the way to sign the papers to get - His grandfather released from the hospital

#32: Deep in Structures of Awareness (Structured Poem)

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In ashen hills of yonder

Poem in A Dead Language Only I Understand, Translated for You

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I used to be a poet, you know. / Better, in many respects, than you.

Flash Gordon in Iowa

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I will show you how, in the spring, the sidewalks here look like a crossword puzzle resting under a glass of lemonade,

Unexpected Flying Objects

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Meanwhile it was four o'clock in the morning, Pacific time. Seven o'clock eastern. The cat was busy chasing imaginary mice around the hammock—at least Manuel hoped the mice were imaginary. He loaded the next digital images onto the screen. It seemed to

Myself Today

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Suddenly I'm not feeling it anymore. / Poetry has become insufficient. / I can't do it like I used to.

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…

Lovelandtown Tavern

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James Hubert III sat at the bar. It was late. His wife and kids were long in bed and he knew he should be, too. But with the Lovelandtown lift bridge stuck in mid-air, a drink beckoned him. He sat next to Vince DeSantos, a small, stout man, with a bowling

To Cancer, with love...

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Why do I love you? The monster that you are? I love you for revealing to me my strength My determination, my will My need to survive I love you for showing me the gift that is living

What I Learned From Magazines This Week

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In his heyday, Burt Reynolds owned $100,000 worth of custom-made toupees.

Postcard from Shambhala

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Dearest Z— There is no way to describe this place. It is a pendulum, caught at mid-swing or maybe just a millimeter on the up side. It is a sense of sweeping, a cleanness. Distant clouds remind me of the day we took the train and the mountains acted petulantly,…

Bad Clean Fun

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It was cold and clammy, but then it got worse. Far worse. Any opportunity to celebrate the unity and harmony of tolerance was soon cancelled.

Spittoon (w.c.55)

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“I’m pregnant,” he says...

Imported Beers of the Romantic Poets

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She burps in beauty, like a frog Who sits on lily pad so green, Resounding nightly in his bog But to my eyes unseen.

My Name is Luka

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The first and easiest reason was that he never hit me. Well, if he never hit me, then how could it possibly be abuse? Never mind the threats to stab me in the neck. He was only angry. He really didn't mean that. Never mind he restrained me, or cornered me