2574 41 21
|
My eyes became purple, and boys called them "picture windows". Well, not boys, exactly, but one girl did. Junie.
|
2574 17 6
|
The Boys The Boys, they call my brothers in the neighborhood, or Those Boys. The Taylor Boys. Sometimes, Mom calls them Thing One and Thing Two, like in The Cat in the Hat. Those bad boys. Nobody has brothers like my brothers, kicked off the school bus, barred…
|
2573 15 8
|
When you return home, one year to the day that you left us, you will wonder if you can do it all over again.
|
2572 9 3
|
She's standing outside the 7-11, skirt up round her ass. Ripe. She could be a whore but she looks way too classy. Plus she has a huge soda - I'd guess diet - and a Twinkie.
|
2572 3 2
|
The pieces of bread dipped us humans in cheese,
the cheese made by cows from our milk.
|
2572 1 1
|
The first morning we met—I remember the rain, soft the way I like it—was a series she later attributed as a fourteen-frame sunrise.
|
2571 6 3
|
We buried her upright, in the stance of warriors.
|
2570 9 9
|
Matilda went wild at sixty-five. Legs left unshaven for the first time in fifty years, hair still and proud, knotted with forgetting. She’d roam the streets at night, a traveler without design. Matilda was a gardener of sorts, digging up all previous assu
|
2570 7 1
|
If you run into my Aunt Lucille, put your head down and keep walking. She knows when a person is going to die. She knows when a fatal disease is heading your way and she doesn't keep it to herself. She told my best friend, Mary Lou Pierce, don't bother
|
2568 8 7
|
A brief commentary on the uselessness of endings.
|
2568 0 0
|
Like gymnastics, shoplifting is a discipline of youth.
|
2567 17 12
|
|
2567 23 10
|
'Hey, are you supposed to be from a cartoon or something?' said the Grim Reaper. I had to take a big drink before I could reply. I didn't know what to say, so I said 'Could I see your watch, please?' He looked down my dress while he thought about it.
|
2567 17 9
|
When Ryan isn’t around, those of us who know him lament that he peaked at 17, at Disney World.
|
2566 3 2
|
It was one of those dinner parties where everyone had had a little too much to drink, and the conversation around the table had grown more . . . shall we say, spirited.
|
2566 31 14
|
|
2566 2 1
|
Simon Ridley only had one special power. Whenever he walked into a room, an awkward silence would descend.
|
2566 12 6
|
It’s about 4:30 when the phone rings. I look at the display and see it’s home.
“Hey,” I say picking up.
“I hate you,” says Jules.
“I hate, you, too,” I say. My co-workers don’t even blink. They’ve heard this before.
|
2564 3 1
|
There are gestures, unmarred by the words put to them after all has failed. When Y. stopped you from talking to apply lip balm to your dry lips. Or she sidled up to you to read what you had written for her. When you lay on the grass together she put her head on…
|
2563 13 11
|
Her mother dressed her like a little girl would dress a doll.
|
2563 23 21
|
The debits and credits of life have been recalculated. You are not due tax; you are owed a trapeze. It turns out you have a natural gift for hanging upside down, knees to the clouds.
|
2562 37 20
|
Make cartography with your mouth...
|
2561 18 7
|
This is the only time she feels she can be herself.
|
2561 7 2
|
I pass the Grief Benches on my way to work. No one is on them today. Last night I saw a couple there, him wet eyed and her with her head down. She scrunched her eyes tight as I passed and I remember thinking she was a fraud. It's alright if you don't want
|
2560 5 4
|
my exposed
flu-ridden head
|
2560 20 9
|
Eighteen-layered canvases were prized by both of them, regardless of whose work appeared on top.
|
2559 36 21
|
The young boy picks up a coin that has rolled to his feet. It is warm, too warm considering the cold air streaming around him.
|
2557 5 2
|
|
2557 1 1
|
Not everybody sees Father. Not Mom, not Dad, not even my little brother, Andre, and he see lots of things. Me, I need to.
|
2556 12 12
|
Columbus Avenue, I’m the tense union of poor city rich city/
gentrification.
|