1211 4 3
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Reams of saggy bunting intersect the streets.
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1211 2 0
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You welcome the new girl by putting a message on her back. I breathe harder until she pops or until you ask me what I’ve seen or until you see my hand turn into a fist.
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1211 1 0
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i could smell it,
my scalp split on
that same damn nail,
i hammered down 20 times,
it kept coming loose
that warped floorboard
i never should have tacked in
when i built this house.
it always squeaked
at the base of the stairs
when i snuck
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1211 0 0
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Writing books is like raising children. You do your best, nurture them, discipline them, coddle them, feed them, patch up their injuries, sing to them, try to sell them, but no matter what you do, they are what they are.
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1211 2 0
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"Already he is running and flying to the center of the world" - Mircea Eliade, about what a shaman is up to, under his mask.
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1211 0 0
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Make paddles of his hands
Use his skull to bail
Rig his thigh bones for a mast
And his skin to make a sail
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1211 2 0
|
"The rider rode his bike in Arizona just about every day and for all the usual reasons....."
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1210 2 2
|
We wait for a server to bring our coconut cream pie. His favorite. I hate coconut.
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1210 8 6
|
Four ships anchor
Far off shore
Chains slip
Beneath the swell.
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1210 0 0
|
"Commander of the Armies of the Four Winds" concerns a nightmare endured by Commander Daniel Bennett of the San Diego Police Department after he is assigned to recover the stolen Necromancer Artifact, which purports to invoke nefarious spirits imprisoned
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1210 13 9
|
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.
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1210 5 0
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I know from the experience of too many odd sideways glances that folks are seldom interested in my brand of observation. No one else seems to wonder how many commas there are in the library or how many other people own that exact shirt.
|
1210 0 0
|
They sat eating and looking at each other. To Ben, Claudia was certainly a handsome woman and a good bed partner, but he was getting more and more suspicious of her motives.
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1210 0 0
|
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1210 2 2
|
Rob slogged down First as November winds tore right on through him that Tuesday at four o'clock in the morning, letting him know that he was the only man left on the face of the whole fucking planet. Except for an old, broke,…
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1210 0 0
|
The music is too loud in here and it's hurting my ears. I know some of the words to the songs because my older sister listens to the same stuff when she's in her bedroom and is playing her iPod and my dad yells at her to turn that crap down. I like my dad. He calls me…
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1210 5 4
|
hangs inverted and
begins a swirling motion,
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1210 10 5
|
the
unutterable
things of
this
world
|
1210 4 3
|
Skulk like a lovespun spider in a record store corner
on the orange formica subway car
|
1210 6 4
|
You have at least
an intermittent belief.
|
1210 0 0
|
It must have been then and in those days and during that time when the grass and short brush, like so much amber and jade, emerged from the snow and the poet Li Po, who while traveling within the ten thousand crags of the Tanggula Mountains, looked up…
|
1210 7 7
|
we can say all we couldn’t say
when the ears could hear us
|
1210 8 2
|
The sometimes shiver that arrives from awkward silences and the more often cold that comes from midwestern winters.
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1210 17 9
|
...swallowed like a radiant yolk by an epicurean barracuda.
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1210 2 2
|
That afternoon, after I'd swallowed that weight. Felt like a sinker, one of those weights that fishermen attach to their line to make sure the line goes down far enough. Go down far enough there, and I'll find it. That's what I was on about, that I had…
|
1209 6 5
|
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1209 4 1
|
Proponents of this pragmatic line of thinking say a tolerant approach to Islam will succeed where force has failed to persuade terrorists to abandon the religious fanaticism.
It's certainly worth a try--it worked with Presbyterians.
|
1209 5 4
|
Star-eaterHere lies the star-eater.Tilting on the ancient wheelof summer-glaze-breath,you speak the oceans. Fire's the mealfor you, the star-eater. You defy death,and out of your mouth, a universe openspouring forth, as fleet as the starslight on your tongue. Space…
|
1209 2 2
|
Why do you lie? the old woman repeats when her mouth is not busy filling the waste bin. We sit as far away from her wheedle and wretch as the small waiting room allows. A young woman glares at us through the mental health clinic's safety glass…
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1209 3 3
|
Nephew Joe, my old brother's son, came to fix our pipes. Strapping, strapless, hairless, tanned, he clinked with gold. He came out to us over the pipes... drip drip...I just wanted them fixed pronto. He took precious time. He cried...drip drip...I wanted him to stop. My…
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