1172 2 1
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To do the proper set up for the story, it was taking me some time, but each bit was important to the outcome, and while he likened me to Higgens on the old Magnum P.I. series, I just laughed at his slowly closing eyes and folded arm, caught in a half cur
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1172 1 1
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“Goodnight,” he said before leaving the room and shutting his bedroom door behind him. She stood in the kitchen alone now, a shot of vodka poured into a shot glass, and a bottle of coke ready to swig afterwards. This didn't make her an alcoholic…
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1172 8 9
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When he saw me, he jumped faster and faster, wild like something rabid.
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1172 2 2
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White sneakers cry, dripping from the power lines.
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1172 5 4
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I watched her look at mewithout any eyes.She turned her head as wesat on the edge of the bed.Instead of eyesthere were hollow indentations of soft tissue,bulbs, and closed,tissue sown, pinched togetherwith pulls and zigzagslike crosshatching, where…
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1171 2 2
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I was born into a perpendicular world
I held Vertigo in my arms once
And gave her a good squeeze
That she just couldn’t get out of her head
Then she would follow me around the perimeter
Where my breath was being held
Against my will
Ah,
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1171 0 0
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It was just a blob. It was a blob that blocked everything from sight that it covered, and it was a blob that refused to remain in one shape or size, but it was just a blob. It wasn't the first time…
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1171 2 2
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His name was Gino. I’ll leave out the last name, not that I think it matters anymore. He came into my dad’s gas station on the near North side of Chicago to have work done on his fancy car. I was still a teenager. I accidentally opened the glove compartme
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1171 2 1
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Hot sweaty bodies slam into each other to get aboard the overflowing subway car. I struggle to wedge myself though the sliding doors, bracing for more bodies to press against mine. The passengers in front of me suddenly stop and fan out.
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1171 0 0
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(and the teacher’s voice, which we realize has just faded in at a drone:)
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1171 1 1
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the arc of her invective presumably aimed at the little boy and girl ambling halfway down the block behind her
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1171 5 5
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most famously, a small/
writhing dog. A thousand casts were made/
before they stopped
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1171 2 1
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How can you stop a man from running naked through your dreams? I want to know. This ought to be taught, somewhere. In schools, or somewhere. I could never stop you from doing what you wanted with me, and didn’t want to either. You had complete leave of
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1171 2 2
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Yes, I had pulled my own heart apart
Yes, I had slipped up on time itself
In its own backyard behind my memories
And scared the crap out of it
By not yelling, just sniffing at its neck
Longingly, tearing it apart with my teeth
Wishing I had
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1171 4 3
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Isn’t it funny how a mosaic of neurons in our heads receives sensations from the outer world and grows into postulates and letters?
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1171 1 0
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You know when you see the flashing blue lights in your rearview mirror that you're not being pulled over because of a busted taillight or carelessly doing fifty in a thirty-five mile an hour school zone; your crime is being a Black man behind the wheel. It happens often…
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1171 3 1
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Crunching gravel beneath my feet, the sound of approaching death.
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1170 0 0
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The sun was bright, warm and blew through my hair like the wind.
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1170 0 0
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I love her now, but I used hate her because she’d leave hairs on my bar of soap.
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1170 6 6
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Deists try to prove the existence of God. I do not doubt God nor evidence of the existence of Jesus nor Jesus' miracles. I merely wish there were more people like him
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1170 0 0
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The rings on the engine
Not designed for race gas
Did allow for some seepage
Did allow fuel to pass
The fumes were quite powerful
To the pan they did charge
The spark was quite forceful
The explosion was large
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1170 2 2
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1170 17 9
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When I came back home, after coming down with polio, everything had changed for me. I'd been gone for forty-five long days and nights. But it was Halloween, a time very nearly sacred for children in the Midwest, and it brought out the charity of the who
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1170 2 2
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Spilled milk it is --lactate of common desire;water under the bridge, slow-moving, white. So this is what we feed on: the past and present here for the licking.Sweat is water too,for the hungry, and any past will do. Parched mouths kiss just as well as…
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1170 1 2
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pulling my bones apart, fingers are supernatural beings
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1170 2 1
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He'd hug us against our wishes when we tried to get a better look at his cart, his odor a mix of sweet and sour and stink.
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1169 0 0
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Motivation always needs to come from somewhere. For some all it takes is a sunny day, a smile from a stranger or a simple pat on the back. Others demand a fire lit, a carrot dangled or a whip cracked. Yet here the sun had set, the fire extinguished and th
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1169 0 0
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Our fingers, arms and toes slither over one another along the smooth crevices between muscle and bone like familiar childhood paths.
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1169 0 0
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Thirty is nothing, she said, Wait till you really start to fall apart. I wanted to tell her I already have, but you can't ever say anything like that, especially not on your birthday, especially not to the woman who's just bought you spaghetti and wants
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1169 14 8
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Sometimes we hurt ourselves, we scratch ourselves, we bleed — for a simple joy... All I wanted to do was to find the poplar again — the tree of my young arms, of my budding breasts. My fingers used to circle around its bold and vigorous waist, but in the…
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