Most read stories

Samurai Kitteh

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She did not know the passage of time, for she was just a bedraggled little kitty, but she stayed behind the lattice for many rising and settings of the Sun.

Oops...

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--small chin, timid mouth, frail nose, weak narrow-set eyes--

WE WOKE UP LEAN

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We were careful not to wake the kids & goodbye with a handshake & my skeleton is trapped with your universe inside.

A Man More Like Your Mother

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Does he pack you a lunch when you're running late for work? Even when you're not running late? Does he insist on regular medical check-ups, for which he'll pay because you don't have insurance? Will he disapprove of your objectionable behavior, and not turn the…

Tuna

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Falling asleep remembering lies that had been built around lies Lies to impress people Lies to make life more convenient Lies, I didn’t even know why I told them.

The curtain

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In the evening the curtain recounts its day. Faces, images, incidents it has observed from the window. Its voice is nuanced, modulated, quivering, for it is made of lace. It appears to crochet its words with needle sounds. My eyes, during confinement, are not wide open, not…

Session Fifteen

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"That it was my stepdad's fault."

You Require Sharpness of Image and Therefore of Words

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I wrote a poem and asked a professor to read it. / He said: IMAGE IMAGE IMAGE IMAGE / like a mad man on meth, foam running down / his mouth crowded with sharp, shimmering teeth.

Harried or Employed

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Irony is written sarcasm. Sarcasm is spoken irony: the opposite of what is meant. Catholic irony in fiction seems deeper and more related to theme. Protestant irony starts with P as do other þing.

Of Roses and Hyacinths

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The blooms are practical/ and cannot see themselves

Carpe Mentis

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machine utility of thought, intangible aesthetic of sentiment.

It's My Birthday

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and the President didn't call.

The Tourists at the Museum

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For the camera she smiles otherwise not and only when she is standing beside him But for the camera? for the crowd for posterity yes For their children for the future? yes, again yes a thousand times until her face be

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

Are You A Handywoman? Take This (Not Entirely Serious) Test and Find Out!

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As I was reading “Not Your Mother's Book on Home Improvement,” a new collection of light-hearted essays by (primarily) middle-aged female do-it-yourselfers, it became abundantly clear to me that, unlike the women who tell their stories here, I am not a…

Feb 1

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On our wedding day he carried all of the furniture out of our small bedroom, created a sanctuary.

Call to Arms

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I call upon all cashiers in dungarees... I call upon the baristas in rags... I call upon those whose sinister principles tax the weakness of their conscience... I call upon all those deracinated by dreaming big...

instead

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instead of gun metal deceit, sounds of malice;be a drop of rain.

Cause of Death

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“You sure?” He nods. “Maybe it was pneuomonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis.” Flash of a smile, sobbing laughter, like an abandoned seal.

I didn't ask for help

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I didn't ask for help

Rescued From A Dream

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There were six people on the bridge, myself included, and we were making our way across when something exploded—it was more a rifle shot than explosion, actually—and it cut like a razor through the delicate fabric of the moment.

Gabe

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“Damn!” he said to himself, wondering for the millionth time what he was doing in such a sad line of work. Break time, he decided, grabbing his stash box and locking himself into the freezing cold bathroom to smoke a joint. He emerged thirty minutes la

Mother's Day

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By lunch: The dryer is an F-5 dervish of mismatched socks, blue jeans and your yellowing college T's, lovingly held onto. For a moment there is a comforting warmth and softness to their smell. In the debris strewn landscape of the living room a carcass

My Flying Debris

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a book of 5 poem-like things I made out of silly string and shot your way when you weren't exactly looking "..kisses are a far better fate/than wisdom."--E.E.CummingsContents:1.The Day's Thin Blue Swim-Suit2. The One Who Needed Let In Most3. I…

Into the Mystic

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Writing opens doors to perception. For example, the glockenspiel smells of gardenias, but the catwalk is opening a can of Franklin stove. It emits fumes of fairyland and olive. And in the green and pleasant country of Scotland and England, vintage trains go…

Nocturnes

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You go out on a night with no moon, when all the stars are flush in the sky, when all of everything, even you, is just a shadow moving softly, and I swear, you can hear it, if you listen hard enough. The music. It’s like it’s coming from under the ground.

Exhumation

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the poems/ we never got to will remain,

Tumultuous Cracker

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The whole scene smells like paranoia.

Chalky goes to night school and studies the Classics

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I don’t even want to think about Aethra shtupping Posiden and Aegeus

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…