Most read stories

The Party and the Body

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The Party and the Body The party at my mother's ended Saturday night deep into Sunday's morning. I tried to remember the exact circumstances of the end but although they wouldn't come it didn't worry me. I knew I would remember at a certain point. It…

no-name time of day

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"covered in a sheen of sweat, flowers of salt bloom on my T-shirt"

hump daze

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Before you start reading this it is important that you understand that I know nothing about the evolution of horses or camels. I mean, I literally know zilch about which came first or if they are even part of the same family. In my head I imagine one of those charts…

Music and Books

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You're all I've got to keep me company, but it's a very fine company. So familiar, and warm as any cold digital fireplace. I can tell you've got more in your story, but it doesn't make you happy. I really do not feel well today. Fun I wanted to…

A Dance at Midnight

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The city was spread before me in a pattern of dancing lights, alternately hidden and revealed by the blowing snow. At this distance, it was almost beautiful. Of course, the beauty was an illusion, obvious only at a distance. If I stood here until dawn, I’

“Because a man has read a book does not mean he is a wise man”

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That night in the stable the three wise men were the only ones who had read books. All the rest became victims of circumstance. Characters amazing in their own right. To be written and talked about for centuries. Totally…

Seventy

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She was a rich widow who lived down the street.

Playground

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The Keds-stubbed grass, toy trucks without wheels, and Band-aids threaded in the sand… Most parenting is vigilance. Seconds ahead of its own sound, a passenger jet spears the heights not far above the treetops, …

Sarcasm

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My tongue lashes out like a whip.

Out in the Street

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As kids, we grew up in a city that we swore was suburbia. Nearly every street had a few houses with a kid or two that was missing their front teeth. There were kids we knew well and kids we'd wish we'd known but they lived a few…

American Soul

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At one time it appeared that Everyone was walking their own angel On a leash, but Now we're not that sure at all And it could come out in song That it might really be the angels Who’ve been walking us All along All this broken glass

deserts wept freely over you

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You had that quietness by nature (unusual in men) that I was attracted to. You were like some body of water, wide and more spiritual than anyone I knew. You could have taken me with you when you flew. I know you were more like a bird than any of the oth

The Emancipated One

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The town was wet from storms and the church was full while the priest gave an exegesis. The world outside did not bother with words or cleverness busy as it was with the real wisdom of its own natural cycles. During the night before, many sheets of rain arrived…

Valentine query

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Did I flirt first?

Clockwhipped

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I now felt prepared to waltz under a K bullet that hits a stucco brick above the tropical hibiscus.

The Parallel World of the Tango

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I dreamed I might one day become the numero uno tango singer in Boston.

Necessary Subterfuge

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I'm very worried that you'll find some reason to leave me so I tend to act overly assertive and dominant due to my insecurities but I hope you understand that this is for your own good and soon you'll know how much I love you

Intensive Seminar Helps Cat Poets Sharpen Their Claws

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With a notch in his ear from an honor-mad fight And a tail that is shorter than at last sunlight.

2 Poems featuring A Century of Art

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"MAN S FEET HAVE GROWN/SO BIG THAT HE/FORGETS HIS LITTLENESS"--DON MARQUISA Century of Art by Darryl Price"Man's feet have grown so big that he forgets his littleness."--Don Marquis Everything in this chummy little place talks to your face without stopping to…

Five Million Yen: Chapter 44

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He found a small place on a side street, Bar Oiseaux Ésotérique. There was a sign on the door that read: Jazz Ce Soir: Giovanni Lezardino: Jazz grillé et sautés. Ben had met Lezardino at the Newport Jazz Festival last year.

Biblos Melas

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While laying in his hospital bed recovering from a minor heart attack, Professor Martin Hellman reads details of an ancient book he has been given for translation--Biblos Melas, or, the "Black Book." Excerpted from the forthcoming novel "Minion Web."

FIREWORKS

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It's eight fifteen in the morning, my favorite time to call, and a guy named Ernie DeCampo answers the door in his work pants and a t-shirt. “Good morning, Mr.De Campo,” I say. “Do you have any fireworks in your home?” …

karmic youth

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We were so easy, so willing to be drained, that to start making those puffed-up stories about us now, our courage, etc. would be purely misleading. Put a bottle, or glass of wine in our hand, and our panties flew off, and gladly we would have followed y

London Calling

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Bloomsbury crowd

Blueprint for a tale

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Remove with care, then slowly lay the string, wide well-soaked end at left-hand edge, to start, and allow to curve, to bend, to almost loop and wind its way at rest across the mottled, patterned green

Reunion

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You’d think we all would have learned something in our hearts since the towers fell, he thought, as Amy slid away from him. You had to get some perspective on the city, some view from outside, far outside, maybe from space, which would have afforded them

77 Words About Nothing [5-24-2012]

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Alright is alright but alright is a state of mind, right?

The Old Man

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The old man tied his black tie and put on a black beret. His bones hurt, but at ninety-two it was to be expected.

Splitting

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Crunching gravel beneath my feet, the sound of approaching death.

Fragments

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Your insincere smile, eyes drowning in kohl. Sweat and sweet talcum, and the maroon cashmere stole.