Most read stories

My Stuff

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

Audience

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At 19 words, the whole piece is a snippet.

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.

Bible Stories for Atheist Babysitters

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What the five-year-old I baby sit for wanted to do yesterday was torture his Barbies. “Why would you want to do that?” I asked.“Because we're bad guys!” said Hanina. “Can't we be good guys?”“Not today. Today we're bad…

Smells Like Burning

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Stanley had a crush on Sarah. They were in Ms. Goldman's freshman chemistry class together fifth period. That day they were working on homework at Sarah's house while her parents were gone. Stanley was in heaven.“Break time!” Sarah woke Stanley from daydreaming,…

Dapplegrey (Where He Lived)

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A short time ago, a man who lived near me got angry. He woke up one morning and torched his house, with his wife and stepdaughter still inside. He drove up I-35 to the Georgetown airport, got his plane, and flew it into the Echelon Building in Austin.

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.

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…

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…

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…

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.

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

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

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

Living in the Death Industry Could Kill You; The Q&A

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Q: Tell me briefly about how you got into the death industry.

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.

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!]

The Angel Closes the Rain

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I may have gone A little soft in the brain But I swear I still see it The angel closes the rain Even God has to refrain From causing us pain When the angel closes the rain So the angel closes the rain At the end of time The angel mus

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.”

Yellow Cabaret

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

Perfect Lady

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I want to write a story about a woman who lies to men about her height.

Acorn Gardening for Everyone

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I'd like to grow you a new flower. I thinkmaybe I just will. Right now. Here's as good a place as any. Well you'll probably never get to see it, but it will be there just the same and it will be all yours. Kind of like these poems that I make if…

waves at least this tall

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the mountains did change/became looming purplish waves/their spray washes us/we rinse slow 'neath lifted waves/that must be at least this tall.

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.