Most read stories

The Nude Pianist: A Novel: Chapter 47

13911391 views55 comments33 favs

—Mr. Martinelli, can you explain how you developed your painting technique?

Canvas

13911391 views22 comments11 fav

The artist with fork and trowel. The paint; soil, seed, seedling or plug.

Getting Out

13911391 views33 comments33 favs

“We have flown the air like birds and swum the sea like fishes, but have yet to learn the simple act of walking the earth like brothers.” ― Martin Luther King Jr.

moon/light

13911391 views33 comments33 favs

the cue & flash

Out of Vegas

13911391 views44 comments33 favs

Whatever it is, the night vibe feeds off that disadvantage, nibbles at the desperation of those who come here.

An Uneventful Night in an Italian Hospital

13911391 views66 comments44 favs

The voice is back! That voice, like milk and honey, like mother, like the school nurse who bandaged my scraped knee.

They Wanted Songs about Love but Got Idle Chatter.

13911391 views77 comments33 favs

Granddad listened to Elvis and then he would talk more or less the entire night. “Mystery Train” was Sam Phillips' song. Then Presley recorded it, but did it up different, sounded much faster so you could feel your hair blow back a bit. …

Sisyphus

13911391 views55 comments33 favs

I build pedestals.It's hard workHeld together by sweat, love, and lofty thoughts - an unsound foundation.The tiniest bit of heartbreak,and it comes crashing down. Always, I blame the builder and not the vandal. The next one will be…

That Day

13911391 views11 comment00 favs

Freedom brings its own fears.

Filaments

13911391 views44 comments22 favs

It's always dark when Cal and I arrive. We park under the bright sodium lamps, closest to the doors. The lights will probably be off by the time we return, unless the sensors miscue in the uncertain light of early morning. When that happens, the lights…

Lady Gaga Via Richard Cory

13911391 views00 comments00 favs

Whenever Lady Gaga took the stage, We peons on the benches cheered for her: She dripped of jewels and paint, and blessed sage, Wore meat as the antithesis to fur.

It’s a compromising situation...

13911391 views00 comments00 favs

It’s a compromising situation... The would be Bride of Christ begins perspiring before the crowd. Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring echoes through the antique church just one more time, a little loud. With every added verse and every flickering vigi

Redneck Haiku

13911391 views1717 comments88 favs

some local color Haiku

Dormilona

13911391 views22 comments00 favs

These fern-like weeds grow along the roads. “Watch this,” you say, bending down over a plant. The touch of your fingertip sets it recoiling, stunned–a fun, jungle trick you picked up somewhere along your way.

The Genius

13911391 views11 comment00 favs

"The Genius has since abandoned all hope of seeing full remission of the Great Descending Haze in his lifetime."

Pomegranate juice thief walks home

13901390 views88 comments66 favs

That is a six-word story. Notice that the meaning does not change with the word count. Syllabic count: pentameter (ten). Keep these commas.

Last Stop

13901390 views44 comments22 favs

So we stayed on the train admiring the time.

Pebbles Against Empire

13901390 views77 comments55 favs

Whatever you have,/ we can monetize it

Refugio Beach

13901390 views11 comment11 fav

We can’t see anything except for glimpses of the other’s eyes, hands, mouths when we move.

Sunny And 78

13901390 views00 comments00 favs

Tombstone is a tongue of stone in the mouth of the desert. The desert is a living entity. It speaks. It speaks with a tongue of stone. It says: Tombstone.

An Elevator Door Opens

13901390 views44 comments44 favs

What’s your favorite emotion? Mine is ripping the sky apart and standing on a star outside of time.

Rapid Transit

13901390 views1010 comments99 favs

We’re on The Worm. I dread the part where the train goes under the bay. I hold my breath until we safely emerge.

Octopus

13901390 views44 comments00 favs

Sometimes I think there's an octopus in my stomach. In the mornings it stretches and droops its lazy head to one side — It suctions it's tentacles to the walls of my belly and pulls them together forcing me To gag, and vomit what we didn't digest of the…

The House on El Nino Diablo Court, Part 2

13901390 views00 comments00 favs

Inspired by "The Dunwich Horror"" by H.P. Lovecraft, this excerpt concerns the events in the life of a man who is coming to the awareness that his son has followed in his grandfather's steps and begun the process of conjuring a spirit that killed him.

Reality TV is Dead

13901390 views00 comments00 favs

Welcome to the world of (un)reality television. He/she who dies with the most stories wins. Another kind of religion. The Church of Being Famous For Whatever.

Variations on a Theme by Pina Bausch

13901390 views2020 comments1919 favs

Threads of sadness in the hands, in the touch

You've Got that Wrong Kind of Brain

13901390 views00 comments00 favs

He and Nick got a long very well, and would speak about things for hours until the morning came; and Betsy would supply them with food and coffee, and clever sayings all the while Johnny watched it all over. Tonight though, they had watched La Rafle, and

Talking Balls and Strikes

13901390 views55 comments55 favs

I don’t see the problem. In the country I come from, language is the best part of the game.

Walls

13901390 views00 comments00 favs

No one would have picked me out of a crowd as the morbid one, but it was true that thoughts of easy exits floated through my consciousness regularly. I did my research—the easy methods, painless, guaranteed methods—and felt prepared to do, well, w

This Is Not A Ghost Story

13901390 views00 comments00 favs

"Man, I'd love to do coke chopped up with the remains of this motherfucker," he said as the unicorn's head smacked against the screen of his netbook for the 12,364th time.