Most read stories

Good Girls, Bad Boys, and Porn

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We’ve all heard the stereotype of good girls wanting bad boys. It’s been studied, ranted about, and capitalized on. Hell, Disney has built a kingdom off the Princess Who Lusts for Adventure and Falls for Rebel Guy with Supreme Confidence storyline.

Summer At Lake Elsinore

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Bess spent the summer that year at a lakeside court in Lake Elsinore. They told her she only had to spend three months there, before she was allowed to have a spot of her own at the nudist camp. Just three months. But Lake Elsinore seemed like something

A Letter

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I write to you from waiting for the world to end. I will leave this in a desk drawer.

The moon rose up on its tinfoil bed

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and floated along withus like it was attachedwith a string. I thought thatmeant we had a boat incase of emergenciesbut she said it was sadto see it followingin our wake like a cork.I still think it looked everybit the stylish silver-capped swimmer doingthe…

That Kind of Body

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I was thin and young. There's a kind of freedom to be found when walking around inside that kind of body, that allows you to have in this world what's known as a presence. People see you eating but they can't make out what for. You're not going to…

The Big Dipper

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She was proud of her breasts, which were large, adult size. I didn't have any breasts yet, but the doctor said not to worry.

Gas Making You Sick?

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It was a sore molar that was giving me trouble, on the bottom right. The dentist, about whose adulterous affairs everybody in the neighborhood knew and whispered about, ts-ts-ts'ed me and murmured "decay" before pulling out the drill.

The Sky Writer

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All eyes aim towards the heavens.

In the nude

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The Italians live on top of the ruins of Roman cities and medieval settlements, of the towns and villages of the Visigoths and the Vandals, gesticulating, fornicating, craving poems, like all of us.

Baby Love

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She wanted one, she said. She wanted one who looked like me. I wanted one, because I wanted her. I wanted her for everything; I wanted her to fill every crack and space inside of me.

10,000 Dollar Pyramid

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During the course of her life Cleo screwed every single President.

under the skin

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Every few days, on one of our walks, the dog and I go down to a shallow, quick river...

In the Dillard's Parking Lot

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My niece Katie is wailing outside for all the world to see. We are standing in the Dillard's parking lot and she is drawing everyone's attention. Well, everyone in a 46-block radius. It has just been that kind of weekend--a wailing weekend. My sister-in-

Gymnopédie Set

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The streets have terrible breath, it’s said, and everyone hides but the young, who have slick, naked shoulders and fragrant tobacco shreds in the linings of their empty pockets.

Bad Marie (An Excerpt)

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Marie knew that she should get out of the tub. She understood that Ellen was at the point of explosion. But Marie was too invested in imagining the picture she made at that very moment. As if through Benoit Doniel's eyes. As if it was a scene in a movie.

Essay on Cranial Electrification and Empirical Clarification

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Although decades have passed since I last tasted lysergic acid with diethylamide flavoring, I cannot fail to remember the tasting.

Sestina McRib

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And now the McRib is back. Two dollars.

She Used to Have Nails

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...the job was easy, just pour and deliver, pour and deliver.

ORSON SCOTT CART, MEET LOUISA MAY ALCART: TOP TWENTY NICKNAMES LIBRARIANS HAVE GIVEN TO BOOK CARTS

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If you work in a library, you work with book carts, so naturally you give them nicknames. You could call your faithful book cart Bumpy, Squeaky, Rusty or Tipsy. But surely you can do better than that! Here's…

How To Make Your Own Falling Star, or Dreamland Begins at Sunset, So Be a Dear and Pass It On, Will Ya?

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The world moves its roving glass eye around in front of you like a dog trying to flip over a frisbee, as if trying to show you how the loveliness of all things here and yet there, from an anything goes, different, always shifting,…

Raisins

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Sylvia used his computer to write two-page stories about women who killed themselves with blue pills because the shirts came back from the laundry unpressed and their husbands stayed out late with secretaries. Every story ended with the image it began.

I Had Time to Kill

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I had time to kill. I got on the merry-go-round, letting it go slow, thinking of starting blocks, how I might push off them.

If You See God, Don't Tell Him

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A wrinkled old woman sat at the table next to me. “Are you a writer?” she asked. “Yes, I am.” “Are you Jewish?” “No, I’m not,” I replied. “Where do you come from?” she asked in her broken English. “Chicago,” I said. “The Bohemian ghetto there, o

Sea of Tranquility

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We weren't sleeping much, either one of us. We went through the ritual, Pat and I. I brushed and flossed and got into bed and read while Pat took her contacts out and applied a…

What He's Poised To Do

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The man is not happy at home. When he sees his wife or his son, he knows that he should be, but he is not.

The Fermi Panic

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Schrödinger's Cat twitched and nodded as he picked up the discards, casting his mind back to 2014, when local confidence seemed at its peak . . .

"I Am Vertical"

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"Tonight, in the infinitesimal light of the stars,/The trees and flowers have been strewing their cool odors./I walk among them, but none of them are noticing."

Sick Cycle Carousel

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"... not just a jerk, you're like the king of the jerks!" the Black man said as they came into earshot. "When other jerks look for leadership, they just pick up their cell phone and you're pre-programmed in as the first entry on their speed dial!"

The Man from OBERIU

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Elizaveta still wore her winning smile, the one that only charmed. She looked up suddenly: “Watch out, Pushkin! (falls over Gogol) “Watch out, Gogol!” (falls over Pushkin).

Godot is a Heartbreaking Figment

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Godot is on the way.