All I need is a break; to meet a woman who has access to a fruit fly database, either personally or through a trust established by her fruit-fly collecting grandfather.

and, under foot,// dark caves waiting/ with their unseen pigments/ adorning forgotten walls.

She was from Tennessee, with advantages over me. An upbringing surrounded by books and sensitivity.

My first love was a woman of principle. Never deny your man was her motto.

I said: “Doesn’t he understand? People like me, geniuses—great, mad geniuses—are prone to failures because we do not accept the common notions of society? Doesn’t he understand? I’m not like the others.”

He draped the sheet over her body. Blood spotted the fabric, rose petals on snow.He left the pistol, but pocketed the first edition she'd signed. Part of his fee.In the park, he ditched the glasses, fake mustache, and anorak before making the call.The publisher called an…

Grow.A word.A verb.Germanic.Feel it.Slow.Old.Young.Now I'll tell you how put it on a page:we'll start with the o.Take your pen just so,thin first,from the centerand thick on the up, thin at the topand thick on the down, thin at the low,finish sharply.The r is a…

The women in the clinic called her misis luluai – it means white woman chief, it was a compliment. She always wore crazy outfits. High heels and pantyhose. And tight, tight skirts. My wife never trusted her because of that

One night while in rehab I had a dream that I worked as a violin maker in Salzburg.

The capsules tumble around, one of them plinking against the crown in my upper-right jaw. I hate the crown… a mute reminder of the first time Brad hit me. Swallowing the capsules, my tongue probes the left side of my mouth, finding the other two crowns…

On the phone I asked my mother how she was doing. “I’m getting old,” she said. “Going slow. But getting there. I’m ninety-four!” My mother was always 94, when she was really 93. I remember she was 93 right after she turned 92. And 92

God forbid you should break one of the camps precious “rules,” which were more or less like the Ten F'ing Commandments around there.

Bake sweet rolls and make love to your new wife, fall asleep for three years and grow a beard.

1. On the morning of her eighteenth birthday, Eve woke to find herself transformed into a gigantic chess piece made of zeros and ones.2. Eve gazed so long at her smartphone that she found herself falling into it.3. She fell for a time that may have been short or long or…

Dressed as an English professor on Halloween I escape the red devil and run downtown. I go to the Art Car hangar I dance, I swing my golden brown briefcase