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Picnicking In Mt. Misery Cemetery

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Picnicking In Mt. Misery Cemetery We breathe the damp shade, plum trees shining in a woodland where there are few wrong things I want to remember-- the steel fence of the power company blazing under an arc light is one. On this day of ripening fruit …

Mothers

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No, no mother’s tenderness: she shows no sign of that … Do you know that she has them make their own bed? No, not the girl: the boys too! Yes, the boys. She humiliates them.

Somebody Loves You

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When I look at the picture on my refrigerator, I always think the same thing: "Hitler was a baby once too, look how well he turned out."

Gonadista Blogsdashiva

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"Shouldn’t I be able to easily get my arms around nothing?”

High Tide, Low Time

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The shoreline was further inland than he remembered, a good thirty feet or so since his last visit. He stood in waist deep water — the waves of the emerald green Gulf tumbling upon his pale white torso. He had always been disappointed with the beach as a child.…

my apartment needs more culture

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the first night we visited/ i stepped on a splinter/ while walking to the car/ and half-limped back,/ hiding a wince.

(give me a real moment with a living god and I’ll go all the way)

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I remember, when I was selling real estate, how you could always tell when there'd been a divorce. One room was conspicuously left emptied of its contents, and these rooms were never swept or tidied. Instead they were left just as they were when the par

Beehive

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Like when she said the word 'but', it came out ‘bet’.

How to Tell if Your Loved One Belongs in the Booby Hatch

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It is well known around town that Ray's dad went crazy. Today, when asked, everyone will tell you that they knew all along he had a screw loose, told their wife, “That Mick Borkowski's gone bat-shit.” But when it was happening, no one paid it any…

The Cure for Cancer

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Thus, more people can drown// and leave their bones

Momma's Elephant

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...she had marked the stars with a blue pen, connected the dots to make Andromeda, Cassiopeia, told us of the gods behind the stars...

On The Way To Shabriz

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these dead letters for you... and then they withdrew... something happened on the way to shabriz... my fingertips fell on their knees.

A Little Man on a Rainy Corner

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He is sitting in the infinite rain and the water is making him some infinite silhouette

(children, children)

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Her name was Carrie. And yes, it was love at first sight. Yes, she was a client, and you were supposed to keep your hands off the clients. Everyone in real estate knew that. She came into my office and took a seat in the reception area. I had a listing on Cedar…

Museum Story Listening

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A sort of invocation of the open sky, in contradistinction to the dark of the Earth whence came the specimens, a figurative marriage of the literal darkness of exploration and the figurative light of knowledge.

Time. Stop.

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So young. So innocent. How do you tell a little one that her mother is dying? The father seemed to be bathing in a sea of hopelessness lately.

Random Little Linguistic Discharges

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Eat the Body/ Drink the Blood/ Perfect the sacrifice,

Excelsior - A Poem in 9 Parts (post 3 of 5)

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IV. From Hoover Dam The intent of passive presence wreathes an endless ring, Invisible, beyond all thoughts and change to sickness. This hour beats sibylline as vacancy, breathing Through mouths that do not taste their nothingness. I do not know where you are;…

Thessaloniki Summer Visit

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What I learned/one summer/in the North East/Thessaloniki heat was. . . .

In the Pink Distance

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in the pink distance / a boy in a corduroy shirt / sits before an upended electrical spindle / and drinks a vodka gimlet

Smackdown

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you escape by finding the bubbles

Musica

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A sizzling as skin and sinew melt, fall away. "Scream if you need to scream, child." And I scream, and her song gains strength. The warmth of her around me. It is time.

The Witch in the Canyon

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There's a witch in Laurel Canyon.She made Wes a promise.Her bungalow smelled like Parliaments. Parliaments, garlic frying in olive oil. Parliaments, garlic frying in olive, and a freshly opened pack of Red Vines. Wes could have curled up into a ball and fallen asleep on her…

Back East

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Could even drift off to New Orleans for a slow sip of a hurricane

Odysseus Remembered

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Years later Polyphemus still remembers the wine-soaked taste of Odysseus’s men. The barley and garlic-flavored Greeks. Their flesh a fibrous, blood-hued hummus. Their crunched bones releasing sweet marrow.

EXAMINATION

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I had the idea while I was in the county jail. I would get jail glasses; I wouldn’t be me; I’d be some other person. I could pretend that it was someone else rotting away in that 8x12 cell.

The $275 Root Beer Float

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That was some root beer float. It cost us a grand total of $275. She pulls up in front of Fenton’s Ice Cream Parlor and leaves the motor running while I jump out and run into the parlor. It was early evening. We HAD to have a root beer float. You

The First Fifth

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The first time that Beethoven’s Fifth was played, people ran into the streets.

Commotion with Coffee

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The retired, widowed receptionist slapped one hand to the base of her throat with a gasp . . .

The Tiger Who Jumped Over the Moon

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Lord knows we all tried to stop him from doing it. You're crazy we said. This makes you look like a lunatic. They'll hunt you down in even heavier droves now. You've upset their delicate memories. I tried to stop him. That's cow territory my friend…