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Vostok

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"[A]ppointed an official supplier of watches for the Ministry of Defence of the Soviet Union in 1965."

Making Waves in Sculptural Math

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It was a summer full of rage and discontent. The air had a new taste to it, reminiscent of the tang of battery acid.

Banger in the Hanger

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song

Calm and Level

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The funeral grounds look level and calm. We leave the urban world behind for an instant. The other world has claimed someone. But we are in limbo. It is a terrible thing when a connection or breakthrough moment is not achieved or granted by the universe. …

For Colleen McCullough

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She was reading The Thorn Birds. Always on her side, in a pink cotton housecoat. The Buddha rested on his side. And drank milk. We drank plenty of milk, but, being Catholic, didn't know anything about Buddha. I would sit there. Piles of books were around. I…

Sinning and Sinning and Sinning

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Then I learned she was revealing all our sexcapades to this young priest. Forgive me, father, I have sinned. We had sex outdoors against a tree in Wisconsin and the tree was blending with our act and becoming one with my back rubbing up against the bark

Injuries Few in Annual "Running of the Cats"

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"We improvised to show our Spanish compadres that we meant them no disrespect, and the running of the cats was born."

Like the Goats

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putting our bones together

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I can still see us sitting, somewhere (was it in a café?) imagining what it would be like if our mutual faces blended into the future (the waiters posing as in a Manet painting.) Putting our bones together, our broad features, Bohemia and Sweden. Yo

The Light Of the Face

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We all have our place But it’s always there, isn’t it Streaming throughout our lives The light of the face Where most of the soul comes to rest We see it best when the hard wind blows Cause in the course of events The wind will know our

Basic Principles of Physical Space

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a body lost in thought stays hopelessly lost in thought for as long as the latte lasts and the coffee shop stays open and the moms don’t gather with their baby carriages and the bums don’t bum overly much and the trust funders don’t lose too

Have You Ever

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Have you ever Felt As if you were Alone In the world?

Ode to a Shopping Mall

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In 1609 Ben Jonson was hired to write a work in celebration of the opening of a new shopping mall.

When I was little

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I was little, very little, when Happiness went away. I moved the entire earth, walked in the ferns, poked in the river. Happiness had disappeared. I looked to the sky. I remember, the sun had the porous face of an orange. Not unlike my skin. My eyes fixed above, I saw it…

A Good Provider -- take 2

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She lay on the cool white linoleum floor. Her eyes pointed at the dust under the refrigerator, but she didn't see it. She didn't see anything anymore. She heard the clock ticking out the seconds. Thoughts ricocheted around her brain at the speed of light, making …

Dave's Note

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Dave Sharpe silently pulled his desk chair out of its nook that was conveniently placed underneath his desk. He took a deep breath as he slowly took his place in the seat and nudged it into a perfect…

Surprise!

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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

Take You Me for a Sponge, My Lord?

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Who does that besides Kafka, Arreola, and Steven Wright?

Proceed here to read some of my work

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http://jrleyvas.net

Loretta McKinley

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After Loretta McKinley had sat for just such a time on a rock near the tribe, hallucinating and coming as close to death and God as she ever had, she walked into the camp and asked to speak with the elders.

Night Letters from the Underground

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As ghosts, they became lovers. Rodion would strum the Underwood keys like a balalaika. Lizaveta would sing.

Savages

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Dream

How the Other Half Lives

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Most of life, it turns out, is pathetic. Very little is funny. We have to generate our own laughter. Canned laughter may have to do. Even if we have to carry the can around our neck like a Saint Bernard or strapped to our hip

Target practice

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...it didn’t take much to just toss it aside and muster up some fresh bravado.

First sonnet

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Shit, I guess I'm gonna hafta

Credits

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I fuck myself. I say never three times. There is a movie in this movie in this. I say hello. Fish are named after capitals of invisible cities. I say so. There is a movie in this movie in. I say flush for a dumpster. The sound of a sound never made. I say equations for…

Writing Poems

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We bring words together and set them up on blind dates. Watch them build a history together, get married and fight together. Make offspring syllables cradled warm in cribs of punctuation. Phonemes squeezed into existence by two parenthesis. Words…

Testament Part 4 of 6

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We once saw giants in the clouds and in/ connected points of stars, and named/ them, gods. We placed them in their high-halled villas,/ on the mountaintop, to game and frolic

The End of History

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Well, I walked in on you, then you walked out on me And that was when it happened – the end of history And that should have been sufficient But I think you know it wasn’t I remember it was you who told me Dreams are only efficient when illusio

The Demon Rum

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the Coke made his butt leak blood