Valerie had purchased a new cell phone in late 2007, and, say a few months afterwards, in the beginning of 2008 a demon briefly took up residence in it. She had just returned home from running a few errands, and set her phone down on her desk. She had been focusing on…

I’ve really had it up to here with people who say “awesome” of things that don’t inspire awe.

I am in a war against the literal. I have sewn these words together to make a stand of birch. I wander the earth gathering moon shadows and swords. Kerosene dots punctuate the Dakota night. An apparition of words hops through a calculus problem and falls into a…

“So–you can get a stimulus check even if you’re dead?” I asked. “hell man–in chicago you can vote if you’re dead. i’ve tried to stay active politically.”

Until the stars form last nightI zoom out with an empty heart.Whose forgiveness forgesseas of overabundance, parksUnder the river's bed as magazine?Jet heavy, my tenses shift in an operation between two frightened doctors. I'm hiding onside: the lines & in the branches…

On the parking lot of the bar, two in the afternoonYou notice the battered car, dented up body of a Ford escort,No hubcaps, plastic in two of windows,It yells a story to youA familiar storyHead into the bar2 O' clock in the afternoonIt's a nice, sunny, warm Saturday…

A sweltering heat sits on the field like a fog failing to move. From the diamond, you were able to see the Chicago skyline poking above the apartment buildings like antennas, sending signals all throughout the world.

We were fleeing Hurricane Katrina We stopped somewhere in Texas at a roadside diner But found a sign that said it was closed All of a sudden as we sat there in our car The shop’s owner knocked on the window And asked what he could get for us

The men stir around so aimlessly

My God is not a God of chance, she said.The year was youth and it was our first dance.She wanted to make sure we agreedlove is for God and lust is for Satan.Of course I do, I said. You're safe with me.Neither of us had moves and were relievedto stand in the corner and…

That some adults believed the drill would save/ us from the blast of fusioned hydrogen// amused us as we quietly curled along

for Melissa together today. I like that feeling. I want to pound a piano into the ground just for you. To your warmest heartbeat I raise my glass. Thank you. It doesn't really matter if they think that's a velvety Elvis…

My real parents lived about 200 miles in the other direction from where we came. But long ago I determined they were too real.

Fat, religious, full of himself,

I learned He was a Schmuck when, on/ the mountaintop, with Abraham,/ I waited on His call: one Isaac, neat.