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Secrets / Cigarettes

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We gave our cigarettes names.

On Display

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Richard gets me started, tells me to undress the two women mannequins in the storefront window

Lionheart

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It has been two days since nearly seven billion people have gained some extent of super powers and I figure it will only be one or two until they tear this planet asunder. I have had to move from my third story loft and take refuge in the basement of my apartment complex.…

Shark

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Violet goes with her mother to the home, delivering cookies to old folks. She's getting to hate how she goes along with everything her mother asks. Some of her friends are rebelling already, and Violet feels something under her skin. It's still just a dark shape, lurking…

Climate Change

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Every year I have a birthday, and every year another of my friends succumbs to cancer or suicide. That's a shitty gift. That is devoutly not to be wished.

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.

The Class of '61

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My head is nailed to yesterday.

JOSEPH YOUNG

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JOSEPH YOUNG Joseph Young You might start with the top of the head, where the heat goes. This is first, first from the womb, the first word. Joseph Young There might have been a faith that placed it in the mouth, not the…

Finger Lost Finger Found

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Little Roy Farrell'd taken a bite of his fourth grade teacher's ear as she bent close to help him sound out the word “grace.” Doc Felter had sewn most of teacher's ear back on, but by seventh grade Roy still couldn't read and never understood that he'd in

Metaphor Therapy

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"Psst! You can't hide behind a broken dream.The gardenia's hint that fills your air with her perfumed scent will remain like a residue on your mind. I wish there were an antidote I could share with you, but alas, my apothecary drawer is empty. Many times it's been my…

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…

Fifty Bucks, More or Less by

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Bearable

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"Don't be dense."

DRA

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DRA musical - 1942… Open on the General Jackson crowded with Marines, headed to (Tennessee Base),at the front of the ship, young men laughing, unrealistic military dreams/wordless chatter... LET IT RIDE .. main character is a marine en route to base...Solo verse,…

Black Friday Crime Scene

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Her name was Christine and she was nailed to the cross of their lust and their greed, and their vengeance

2011

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This year, 2011, you bring about my thirtieth year. I'm apprehensive about this, but mainly because my father made me watch "Logan's Run" as a kid...

A Martyr

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I've written of this and I've written of that, Have scriven as you have it either that or this: But if you strive against the wind when you decide to piss, They say, you'll find up firing against your hat- Like some old Brother who was broiled when…

Snark

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His Danger Pistol was out of bullets, his Bag of Tricks was empty, and he wasted his last can of Antimatter back at the lab. All he had was his Charm and his wits. Charm wouldn't last forever, and he'd always come up a little short in the wits department.

Off Shoots

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My name is Lassie.

The Thrill of a Lifetime

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I honestly can’t say, with Lynda, who cheated first. More than likely Lynda did, because I know she was pregnant when I came home from college for the summer (this was 1963) and we had to go out and find a doctor who would give her some pills to get rid

Perdita in pieces

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Perdita's confusing profusion of parts makes it impossible to know which way up she goes.She flutters beneath the camera's shuttered stare, …

Actually I Train Woodpeckers for Al-Qaeda

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Now that Spring has sprung I am reminded about the day a former neighbour complained about my squirrel collection. I love to feed the black squirrels that gather in my yard and she became convinced I had trained several ninja squirrels to enter her garden

Smackdown

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you escape by finding the bubbles

Weather Forecasting

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By the time the forked tongue of the flag extended flat like it was pressed between two of my thick volumes on weather forecasting, the man was still walking with his nose glued to the ground.

The Wedding

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Anneliese inserted one of her crystal drops in Hymen's left ear and kept her left earring in. For a quarter, she bought a handful of cashews and plopped them on a red napkin.

The Phosphorescent French Fry

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She's speaking again, this time in whispers. Her head is shrinking in on itself. If there is a way to save her I'm not aware of it.

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.

Never End a Story with "And then he Awakes"

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Leaning toward Joshua, Stuart says softly, “Take it easy, okay? We’ll bury him. He shouldn’t be left here, in your kitchen.” Joshua glares. “Don’t you fucking move him.”

Nail polish

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Those in the house don’t notice the sweaty woman on their lawn any more than they notice the Ruger LCP pistol she holds limply in her right hand.

Dina Goes to Belfast

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Dina was a woman obsessed. She had endured a three hour layover in Chicago and another four in Heathrow for this. (The flight she had enjoyed with a few glasses of red and an HGTV show about plumbing that she could watch again and again.) She had staked out this corner of…