it's all a bit like the quiet steam drifting to nowhere off my microwaved hot coffee in the sunflower mug

The old-timers at the Working Man’s Club wear a sheen of indifference every Wednesday night. Beneath the wafting, cresting mountains of burning cigarettes smoke, the train-track rattle of dominoes chipping at the dark wood tables in the corner, the consta

A spot in space observes all this, with its eyes arching over on their stalks. The observation point dangles one eye above the other, turning the roundness of them suddenly.

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

What was heinous about it was how easy I assumed it would be. That was truly heinous, and it was a mistake in the end to think of it that way. But I’ve learned from what’s heinous. I’ve bought a plastic cylinder filled with nylon zip ties. They’re great f

So you don't want to give your dog an ordinary name like Fido or Spot. And you love books. So, naturally, you turn to your favorite literary classics when it's time to name the new puppy. The result? This list of actual canine names inspired by literature (from…

Are all my words lonely, or nearly departed; decapitated; Visible only from the ankles down, nonchalant? I Get bored. All my words are not paying Strict attention to the television. I get dysfunctional. My words, coincidental though they…

It was as if every wrong foisted upon his ancestors stirred up a war in him and he was charged with intending the canon at the living.

I find it more fun to be a pirate

I have hate and it is black not midnight, crisp fresh clear. Unadulterated. It is dirty, poor, gritty solid rough like unripe stone fruit. A peach, mealy and dry. The killing, effete, endures. Silent, my repugnance, sick, eats…

The damaged lining of this awkward appellation is just bewitching, begging of the light test prod — OW! and then stern mastery: Introducing the cruelly hooked thumb with ragged nail, plunging up, ripping into and down…

She felt the ants crawling across her arms, felt them digging into her flesh. The needle was still attached to her flesh, bruises lined along the stretch of skin. Her body convulsed until she slipped into slumber. The following morning she could no longer continue her self…

Luke and Diane sat at a round white table looking around the room. There were clusters of people forming an archipelago of cordial exchange and small talk. All but a few were strangers, friends and family of his sister-in-law Mary, now a widow, though the word sounded…

In which era was it not a scary world?/ Last century, the perils were both red and yellow/ after Jerry was undone. Now, they’re brown/ and cross, without respect, the Rio Grande

But if He makes you happy, stands/ as bulwark against the vast, indifferent/ and deadly universe, then cling to Him