Most read stories

Valedictory

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A speech that could not have been anything but earnestly prepared, sweated out under a hot light bulb while june bugs thumped against screens, delivered to fellow graduates, relatives, a state senator, the high school principle, and faculty representatives, all seated …

Luhvvz Lang-widge

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Th heeet frum mye skin on ers wus mehsidge eenuff.

Jeremy's Crane

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I saw magic for the first time when I was eight, on the day Jeremy Chendo showed me that paper cranes can fly.

gravelortian part 4

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rinse plate cup glass spoon bowl soapy water

Loop

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At night, I watch TV shows with fictional characters who lead my life.

I Take Out The Garbage

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I Take Out The Garbage

Female Scent-Marking in the Suburbs

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We watched through the plate glass window, like kids watching a mother guppy eat her young. A woman approached the sweaters but stopped suddently, as if she sensed the dark force Darth Vader projects in Star Wars movies.

london walking (empty streets)

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st. paul is steeped in fog. mist and rain make the north side a grainy faded photograph, almost timeless.

Improvisational

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This is not her death. This is absent-minded omniscience. This is impossible. And then again, the inside-out, implosion. And the hall was clogged with bodies; none of them hers, but who could be sure?

My Nashville Song

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I smell ham and biscuits I ain't eatin' Triscuits No more No more, no more Gonna get back on my Harley With my mutt named Bisquick Charlie I just ain't eatin’ Triscuits No more, no more And I heard you know the score Yeah, I know you

Listening

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I remembered every noun and matching verb, Simple sentences only, two words divided by a line,

extinguished

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The silence grew louder as it grew longer.

Mother

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He stood in the doorway of his mother's house. The doorway that separated the living room from the kitchen. Out of habit, he picked at the wallpaper. He had done this for years as a kid. Anytime a corner pulled up, he started tugging. Just a…

Five Million Yen: Chapter 25

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Ben Clarone watched Dan Arris get into the Brighton Beach Car Service car and leave the departure zone of the Pan Am Worldport terminal at JFK. Ben’s rare all wood contrabass clarinet, which his repairman, Sal Frompini, had spent the last six hours adjust

A Haiku In Spirit But Not In Form On the Fine Art of Sumo

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Two titans move opposite one another

TV Eye

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the world’s biggest poser fags

"It's Just Breakfast" Fills Dating Service Niche

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"Too many people were presenting themselves in a false light on lunch dates,” she says. “The power ties on the men, the come-you-know-what-me pumps on the women–that’s not what married life is about.”

Journey

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She looked out the window. It was raining. “Better than snow” she told herself. She didn’t mind traveling. It was good to travel once in a while. By road, when someone else was driving. Like now, on the bus back home. It gave you time to reflect, re

Wish for the Left Hand

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Hardly a soul could pin him for creating the vehemence that found a streamule to her pen if she wrote in cursive or a fanjet to her keyboard if she typed quickly and satisfyingly in print, employing eight fingers and two thumbs—

Closed Letter to Management

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don’t ask me to set my goals./ I have none except safe air to breathe,/ a reliable roof,/ something aromatic in the oven.

Mom Dream, from the Family Album

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She was trying to hold something, gathering in … lips blue/ black, saying: “I’m all right.” I remember her telling me, over the phone one time: “It’s a baby rabbit, and he was having a picnic. He was chewing away and chewing away. I had six tomato pla

What Happened To The Rain Dance?

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The water quality will give you a hint

Determination without Negation: A Love Story

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In dreams begin responsibilities--Yeats I'm writing this story to tell you about a mistake, despite the fact that you might find it boring or might consider my writing style onerous or overeager. I begin with…

If the Shoe Fits

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

Mr. Townsend Wakes Up

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Mr. Townsend is a normal guy. He's been on auto pilot a while. When he finally snaps out of it, he's surprised at what he finds.

Coconut Milk

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"The baby's head..it was so big. There were complications...I saw it all. They tried to get me out of the room but I saw it all. He split her apart like a coconut Norm! She was gone like that."

The Magic Treehouse

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It was an unseasonably warm day in early spring when I first saw the man in the treehouse. The boys had just climbed onto the school bus, the older with shoulders hunched, weighted down with the gross unfairness of his early adolescent life, the younger still scribbling…

gravelortian part 18

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A poor boy scribbling

Spider on a Red Thing

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Equality became the next goal, rendering gay redundant in describing marriage. Gaelic life is ringed with sharing and lent the word slogan.

Deciding to Leave

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...Yet today, I fear / ordinary names for fantastic objects: Sex, Love, Mind.