Most read stories

the PC birds have come home to roost

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I want the luxury of hearing other people who disagree with me tell me why I’m an asshole!

Small Ghosts

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the mother tells her child the flashes at the horizonare fireworks, not bombs, so he will not be afraid.at night he curls by the door or else he follows her to a different place. he is quiet, then. as if he knows the secret challenge.better if he and all the others…

50 Minute Fight

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Snap! Dylan’s arms flung forward as the rod bent toward the ocean. “Holy God! What did I snag?

the total compiler

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The idea of an infinite textual universe occurs in many places in the works of Jorge Luis Borges. The contexts and permutations of language, which others had held to be perhaps infinite (allowing themselves to use such an imprecise term), that…

1740: My 7th Great-grandfather

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a half-moon hung straight up and down

Twain

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. . .the clock of lips, timing their avid omens --

In an authentic Irish pub in Las Vegas

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In an authentic Irish pub in Las Vegas where over much crowd noise the three of us are discussing Yeats, Joyce and Lady Gregory. We’re in an Irish pub after all, plus the fact we’re literature profs attending a Vegas academic conference.

The Fourth Prague Defenestration: 9

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The Third Defenestration happened during the Soviet era, by the apparatchiks. The only thing that saved the people from certain death after being thrown out of the window of the Prague Castle, was an enormous pile of horse shit below, or haufen mist, as t

No Place Like Home for the Holidays

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Lu loved his mother, but her anxieties nagged at him like poison ivy. You can't avoid scratching it, but the more you do, the worse it gets.

Never Said

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We're at the Park Diner. My dad Tommie is sitting across from me. He looks haggard, tired. His skin is pasty and washed-out. He's not talking, so I'm not talking either, but it doesn't matter because it's hanging there between us.Cancer.Motherfucker.“Don't look so…

“Yo Donnie, Hawyadoon?”

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“Fine, Tony, fine. I'm brilliant . How many times have I got to tell you my name is Donald now. All the time you're with that disgusting, “Donnie,” a grammar school name. Get some class. You own the matzo factory now. You're not just another…

Return to Porthfeddon

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Once upon a time he'd thought her as cold a fish as her aristocratic husband

Arcana Magi Pure Vol.4 - c.2

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Mayumi and Emi followed Nina through a path away from the shrine grounds. It was narrow, but the plants did not interfere with their progress. Flowers showed signs of wilting, unable to handle the cold slowly coming in.

The Cosmos as Gerunds

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There is no there or where but rather/ trajectories of probability

Roger's Box

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"I see flashing bright bacteria floating in the air," he replied, not bothering to think about the words. "I see puffs of smoke issuing from inappropriate objects. Fingertips. Baby carrots. Furniture... Oh, Christ," he seethed, arching again. "Get me some

Suicidal god

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My dog’s on suicide precautions. I had to take away all her eating utensils--even the chopsticks. So now she has to eat directly from the bowl. It doesn’t seem to slow her down.

The Tribe of Women

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One can’t predict the final cadence of one’s life.

How To Find A Galaxy In The Dark

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I don't know what I'd expected from the week of mourning after my mother died but I sure hadn't pictured this marathon cocktail party. Our house is packed with people, food, booze and borrowed chairs. People I haven't seen in years keep turning up with casseroles.I'm…

The Museum

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Flicking through the sheets on her clipboard, Evelyn double checked the address with the mismatched numbers on the letterbox. Its mouth was a rusty, gaping grin like it had lost its dentures.

The Nude Pianist: A Novel: Chapter 17

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Friday night in Little Italy is a big night.

Thoughts That Wake Me Like a Bad Dream 1 through 3

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The police states of German National Socialism/ and the Soviet Union are but pencil studies

Duluth Harbor

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"And yet she always went on writing, even when nobody cared if she did or not: if she stopped, she told an imaginary prosecutor in her diary, 'I will not have earned death.' "

“The Confession of the Sorcerer of Darkness”

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A dark and mysterious account of an ancient traveler seeking arcane literature, and the miserable results to him after he receives what he sought.

Tilt-a-Whirl

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the carnival ride hurtles the spinning man over canyons of light and barkers & streams of cotton candy girls

The Scripture of the Mountain

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Abstractions excite me. I can't say why. There are treasures in the mountains. Extremities and peaks. Romantic cures and the curious juice of blackberries. The truth and authority of rock. It feels impersonal, and tilts into eccentric configurations. What is purpose?…

Twilight of the Trotters

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Neither you nor I is old enough, of course, to remember that America’s most popular athlete once was a horse.

Half Awake in a Fake Empire

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Cooking dinner for one in a city that isn’t my home. A beautiful city that I’m slowly losing interest in, just as I become a local. In a tiny apartment set in the most realistic part of town, I’ve turned the music up loud to drown out my thoughts.

Breaking Point

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I can do the hot coals, no problem. Or, your love, eyes closed. Or your sneer, spank, suffering, resentment, rejection.

A Life of My Own - 7

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The park is filled with tents, tarps, and supporting structures, along with hundreds of diverse individuals seeking a common focus, wanting to make a difference, expressing an abundance of opinion, verbally and with signs.

Genesters

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There once was a lake skipping stone and it skipped, five times, the end... Ceiling fluorescents brilliant in the white space opened to the exterior of the Hog n' Bluster hero shop through the narrow glass front and shown out to the empty brick paved commons of…