Most read stories

You Knew It

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was only a small enough matter of time before you started to show up as new words like soft pink clues dropped inside tiny fingernail teacups to find their innermost meaning, then wishes, floating up near the top like…

Homeland Security

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By the time I got back to the island only Henson was still alive. He didn’t speak; the gun said it all.

If the Shoe Fits

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I didn’t say to eat your keys and parrots. It was peas and carrots. Idiot!

I heard you singing in the bedrooms

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I heard you singing in the bedrooms with me. The down I was fond of, down of your cheek, your thighs light blonde in the light. Out of the dark, sweet bay, were you like a shining rock, shining white, undulating, a thing of heat. I remember you, yes!

sirens

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I know what that coast was like, where you went. A coarse country filled with malodorous women that sang from the shores. Groups of nine stripped to the waist. Some with braids hanging down their back. Garden beauties. Visual porticos, with their floral

An Eventful Inconclusive Evening

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. . . I just didn’t think to call the mortician from the phone outside the grocer’s store, how gauche that would have sounded to any passers-by, a call to a mortuary from outside a grocer’s store!

gravelortian part 18

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A poor boy scribbling

The Busy World is Perfectly Happy

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to continue to crumble its way through another grinding cycle of slowly walking to the edge of the universe ancient treelike beings, like gentle ghost buffalo, and our own thundering buildings by the hundreds of thousands, …

Red Hair

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She was the middle child, tall and lank, red haired and strong, in a girl kind of way. A girl forced to cope with something tough and objectionable. She was the care giver to her younger brother, making sure he got out of bed and ready for school. She did

Renewal

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At first he thought it was a cat she was holding, swathed in a white, fleece blanket

the body that has the heat

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Dream, swan, dream of your woman, whenever you get hold of her. Problem after problem lets up under the grip you have. And conquest without plan is what you’ve added to the world. So, share your songs under wild silk, won’t you? I remember there was hel

The Knife Edge

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Max understood this perfectly and could easily picture the slow-motion buckling of the spars and the accordion collapse of the fuselage as the propeller blades’ churned up the ground.

Wild turkey chase

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“Don’t ever call me that name, formal or informal, okay? Forget you heard it.”

that whistle of yours

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I heard a story once that said we are all entitled to seven good years. No, wait, that is not exactly what it said. Rather, it was more plaintive and inquiring. The feeling that song gave was more one of asking the question: Wasn’t I supposed to get sev

Payments

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What it was for, didn’t matter. When Susan walked into Fred’s house every few weeks and start talking, he’d just nod and say, “Sure, I know how tough it is out there, baby.” Then they’d drink some wine and put on some music, and he’d give her a little mon

We shall wait and see

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Then there is Ethelbert's husband whom Ethelbert hasn't met yet, and who has literally weighed in, as if fed up and tired of waiting for a long, in full length, needless, wake up story. That is when Ethelbert asks, "Amy who?" related to a different group

Blood and Rain

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There's no rain--there hasn't been rain in weeks--but the clouds are dark without the sun, and I can't see the stars.

Anxious Whittle Anxious

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Son, could you please step out of the car?

The Boss

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When I was eighteenI worked at a convenient storeAnd the owner was from PakistanAnd he dressed well and Smelled of cologneAnd owned two storesAnd was always going back and forthBetween the two of themHe had to make sure we were doingOur jobsAnd whenever some kid…

77 Words About Nothing [5-01-12]

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You looked innocent and I was the epitome of just that …

the starry night. van Gogh

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Fortunately not all of the stars are represented in the sky, which is already filled enough with them, or their influence. Two separate swirling rivers of light are flowing into the picture as it is. And each of the stars and the crescent moon are pregn

BODY OF CHRIST, Chapter One

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The sound wasn’t coming from her dream, it was coming from inside the house. Somewhere outside her bedroom the noise was gaining power. Each pitch climbed higher with the urgency of a smoke alarm. With hands over ears and a hazy brain she got up from her

The Thief of Words

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That's my memory, kept and clutched as with a sixth sense, that it was a prim Oriental afternoon, with the pink streaks in the sky going God-knows-where down across the park, but very far away. Ghostly, melancholy travellers. Birds met and crashed headlong somewhere up…

Our Enormous Fat Man

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Pity would have been appropriate. Yet, townsfolk whispered behind his back. Shouldn't he do something about it. So lazy. A gluttonous swine. Hadn't his mother kept him too long at tit, breastfeeding ‘til four? Look. Look at him now. A fat man. Our enormou

Section 8

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To a desert island I pick a book of crosswords for my one item. It is a desert island. What could be more practical? I awake in the middle of the night, an itch in my throat. I blow my nose. Weird gobbets of blood ring my Kleenex. It drizzles out now, wet here, gelatinous…

The Angel with The Broken Wing

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"She was like a perimeter guard for an advanced race of beings who looked human but were somehow para-human entities focused only temporarily within this dimension."

The Bookshelves

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rows and sections of casually arranged selectionswell crafted but haphazardpretty objets d'art randomly placed as cluesto significant life moments and revealing preferencesmy mother was an interior designershe would have clucked her tongueher head cocked to the sideas she…

Going Along for the Ride

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You could hear her coming from a long way off like she kept trying to catch her breath, like she was getting the fun rattled out of her bones. But it was laughter, always laughter that kept on filling up her belly from the inside and she was

Cannaregio confrontation

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I did as I was told, running barefoot down the bare wooden stairs

A Willing Forgiveness

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I head out the door into Blustery cold winds Walking to my start mark I begin… Expecting in moments To hear the regular symphony Of anatomies brilliant Symmetry… Then I realize In my haste I have been thoughtless It will exact a price… …