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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.

A Harsh Pep Talk

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You are nothing but a generic white man with average looks and intelligence, trapped in an indie romantic comedy. You sit in your overstuffed coffeeshop chair, drinking an impossibly befoamed cappuccino, the sleeves of your flannel rolled up to your elbows, mellow synth…

Gusts

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a girl in a red cap flashes by

Changes

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She was sitting in her swivel chair talking to a girl who was her younger image, ... “Well, there you go, I’m a fire sign and you’re an earth. That’s just the way it is.”

20. Smitten

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Your tunamelt cadence / Sank me to ocean floors

(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…

My Stuff

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Crass, vulgar, boorish, impaired, angry, depressed, jealous, regretful.

The Blueberry Man

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It was a Thursday. That's when I found out about the blueberries. Those precious, round little wonders, now forever untouchable.I left the note on the ledge of the balcony, taped down so it wouldn't fly away.It was going to come to this, eventually. After…

The Green Glazed Elephant

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The elephant was breakable and I know that my grandmother held her breath every time I went near it, and I was repeatedly cautioned that it was not to be played with only admired. She taught me in her own way, respect for it. She may have commented on the green with a bit…

If Hell...

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the sour waft of a secret

Golden Dawn

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Rose would have preferred to survey the wreckage alone, between sips of her earl grey, but the morning light drew her attention to blonde and jet black curls weaving into folds of fabric.

The Nude Pianist: A Novel: Chapter 28

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On Monday, Michiko returned from Cleveland in a foul mood. She called Frank’s studio at three in the afternoon.

Woman at the Bar

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I saw a woman / at the bar tonight

The Sun's Curtains

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It must be nice not to have to worry About certain things because those things are not yet In your circle, or in your circus, of life. I don't begrudge you for being almost grown in A much different, sweeter place and time. I'm thrilled By…

Metropolitan

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Metropolitan I. Atlantic harbinger of this our swaddled dawn: Mistaking moon's sea sweep for this the frown The sky's plain-countenanced creatures maytimes weep Upon the surface-sundown of our lawn, When gaily surfaced for…

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.

Off the Record

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“In other words you're going to lie through your teeth..."

Ego with Toupée

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[WE'LL LET *YOU* BE THE JUDGE!]

pink sizzle rizzle

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if you have a key fob, you are fired. If you have a real set of keys, you can stay

Gun Play

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The guy – it’s Billy Krazik - turns and aims at Jamie Stockwell, sitting there calmly as if he’s in the play or something and he takes two to the head.

The Prince of Beers

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“All I want,” he was heard to say, “is a date with a really good-looking woman before I go away.”

Good boy.

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It’s quite simple - don’t move. No fake or feint - just stand your ground. The fixed gaze, the thousand yard stare, hold your place.

Halfsies

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You and she might make love here, next week, and I'll buy my own razor, switch from baths to showers. I shave my legs in my imagination. They, like life, are smooth.

A little bit of babysitting

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Roy Williams was his real name. It had been for the last 15 years. Since retiring from the Firm he’d lived innocuously in an apartment near the Old City walls of Dubrovnik doing the occasional quick job for them. You never entirely retired from the Firm.

Casualties of War

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When Jimmy – and Frank and John and all the rest – joined up, it all seemed a big lark. Little Mary – she can’t have been more than about five years old – was dead proud her Dad was going off to fight the Germans. I doubt she really knew who the

The Glassblower

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His beloved are paper-thin when he blows into the free end. Green tint from copper.

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…

Mr. Feisty Mischievous

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His nervous cackle makes me sick - Oh, if only - Times were different - That knife - Would fit so nicely in his back

What He Delivered

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Yellow Cabaret

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Hail the yellow cab the yellow one will do just fine as second condiment to the sun