I was born at the age of 42. Some of you might regard that as a handicap, but at the time I assumed everyone was born fully grown in a corporate test kitchen. In fact, I still think of it as an advantage; like being born with a silver spoon in my hand.

The next post card was of gondolas in Venice. “Have never not enjoyed ourselves less,” wrote Sylvia. “Sylvia can be hard to please,” said Angelynn. “Those boats could use a coat of paint,” I said.

I could be dead wrong.

“Is that an erect annual plant in your codpiece, Mr. Flax, or are you just glad to see me?”

Today is the last day of the semester. It also marks the end of my tenth year as what is referred to as an adjunct, an appendage, a necessary but unidentifiable tentacle in the College of Architecture at Andreas Tangen University in Los Angeles.

Keisha selected a strawberry swirl cupcake from the waiter's tray, so pretty, from the hottest, coolest, newest patisserie. Moist strawberrylishious cake, swirly pink frosting, sprinkles. Keisha was one lucky lady, scoring a bizdev gig at recession-proof…

There were too many laws but not enough of the kinds she wanted. She wished for the right to go shopping. Then taste rather than disposable income or access to finance could distinguish people.

It is your music that makes me want to crack open my ribcage and rip out my heart as it still beats, to cauterize my carotids, and shove the mechanical insides of a clock into my thoracic cavity.

lying back on inviolable sheets, your breasts spread apart like a child’s open hands you’d look up at me and smile

It waited and witnessed the seasons complete a grouping and form a year. Then it watched them do it again. Winter, spring, summer, fall. It watched from the inside of course. But it could see. Big sliding glass doors and long and wide windows stayed the course also, way…

My wife makes coffee naked. Didn't used to. Back then, before the accident, she hated her body. Says that's why she gave it to me. She's serious about it too. The coffee, I mean. Developed a whole ritual around buying, measuring, pouring. Every day it's the…

On these days, while Momma counts the money, we go to Blockbuster where we can pick a movie each, play on the playground at McDonalds, lick tall ice cream cones.

but most times/ it’s just improvisation// with phrases of unknown origin/ swirling in my head

For weeks I hadn’t been able to think straight, waiting to lay vision on those majestic, swooning breasts.

Artie Shaw gave Ava Gardner a reading list in preparation for their honeymoon that included The Brothers Karamazov, The Origin of the Species, Das Kapital and The Magic Mountain.