Most read stories

Toy

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In the store, multi-color kites dance along the ceiling. And in the costume aisle, a young mother shows her daughter how to tie her shoe. “Bunny ears, around the corner…” Glass animals shine in rows on high shelves. A boy examines lengths…

And in Chicago Yet, and It Was 108*

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It was the middle of the night when she started hearing voices. She thought the voice was saying, “Hello Dolly, Hello Dolly,” and that was when she called the building manager. It was the middle of the night, but he came up to her apartment anyway, be

Puppet X, 4

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I'm not a practicing angel, ladies and gentlemen Got these penny wings out of boredom I need to know that black and grey place inside an angel where you bow your head, when a puppet forgets himself, when a man learns how smal

inflamed flower of your youth

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What was it about you that so inflamed the flower of our youth? That you could touch lightly that which illuminates all splendor and simplicity? That you could reach beyond mere flesh directly into the gates of heaven, and put me there, floating within

In the Sun

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The light was bright andthey sat on the railing of the long wooden bridge in the sun. She looked up at her father."Oh Daddy, where did you go?" she asked.He was young with black shinny hair blowing in the wind. "To Heaven, little girl,"She shook her head."What's…

Black Wheat, 5

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Maybe love shouldn't exist . . . If we follow this notion there is no great need Where does it come from, this great need? . . . If (it) is in the blood how do they get it out? If not, where is it If they do not allow thought

Conference of the Birds

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If in the course of a discussion of improvements someone says: “I have no idea” in a particular way at a particular moment, “I have no idea” will migrate and soon lots of people will find themselves saying “I have no idea” again and again without knowing

Cloudstopper (poem)

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She was Clementine Cropper and didn't you know She's the one you remember when there's talk of the blow.

Zombie & Zombie, Attorneys at Law

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“Are there really, truly zombies in Haiti?” “Bien sur,” he said. He had even seen them: affectless men and women with a deathlike pallor, high nasal voices, and the characteristic drooping at the chin.

In Survival Bid, DAR Tries Fajitas 'n 'Ritas

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The DAR Recruiting Party included a martini bar, an eclectic mix of music ranging from Devo to Lawrence Welk, and “quoits,” a Colonial ring-toss game that newcomers play to win membership discounts and Talbots gift certificates.

What It Took To Be God

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You had to put up with Sunday drivers You had to love children All children, all of them! This is what it took to be God It wasn’t fun You had to be patient, sometimes You had to pretend to look the other way You needed to lose your he

not Baudelaire's “Beauté”

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I charm as any stone-sculpted dream: / men grind themselves to dust on my breasts / in solitude poets spill and spew / enraptured of my adamant clay.

Ballgame

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She knew that she was bland and overweight and dull; that what was beautiful in her was locked away like a tiny maiden, far, far away in a tower, too difficult to find or reach. She must face her lot, grateful for her family and her work.

Don't Know What's Gotten Into You, Young Man

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I remember one of my old high school intellectual friends introduced me to what he called a real wild blond girl named Sally or Marnie or something that summer of 1964. She was tall and blond and thin and looked like a model. Boys were usually afraid to

almost

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The only time Terry and I came close to fucking, when she was still underage, I mean, was once when I went to see her at somebody’s apartment where she was baby-sitting. She invited me over to have pizza, I think. Of course, I brought beer. And we start

Beautiful

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Adam, bronze and lithe, runs laps on the beach

Uffdah! (rise to a standing position) Oy veh! (settle to a seated position)

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Cameron Diaz

The Supporting Oscars

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Weekly game night for the Oscar Family. Winning is secondary.

Cloud 9, Really?

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I wonder, just a thought Who even dreamt to Teach a pig Latin? And why a starfish Mirrors the stars We do not know There’s a whole lot To wonder about Like, I don’t know How about Cloud 9? I want to know what happened On Cloud

Nuptial Indemnity

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She had a body like an upside-down viola da gamba without the sound holes, frets or strings. Full at the top, narrowing at the waist, slender legs where the neck should have been.

Rodrigo Ordonez, Boston Traffic Matador

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Ordonez gives me a look that speaks a volume–Volume 4 of the Encyclopedia Americana, Birmingham to Burlington, which includes the subject of bullfighting.

Music in Berkeley

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There I saw a woman with dyed long red hair Dressed all in furs and a short tight skirt Way too young for her age And she was banging a tampon on her leg At the performance of Ramblin Jack Eliot And no one got up to throw red wine on her Ful

Viva la Doglady!

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The dog catcher appeared to be trolling the neighborhood in his doggy death van.

Life's Unfair--Period

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Darling, forgive me if I seem a dunth But why must your period come oneth a month?

Swallowed Gulped Engulfed

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Last night the thesaurus exploded. Don’t ask how. It just did. Exploded. Burst. Blew up. Flew into pieces. Discharged.

To an Unlikely Muse

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These frail things, swimming to shore, heads barely above the foam.

Why is There Scientist Instead of Wisdom?

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Scientism/Natural Science is an Idealism:Diogenes is said to have refuted Zeno's theories of motion by taking a stroll. We must presuppose that there is such a thing as a stroll before there can be such a thing as a stroll. We must think that there is such a thing…

From Eternity To Here

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I don’t know how the nights can be so long when life is so short. Can you tell me that? I always thought you were maybe fooling around a bit when we met, with that evasive bull about your initials on that brandy snifter, with that JAM person! I ju

I heard You Like the Back Seat, Honey

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It’s okay if you do

Automatically Writ between Meals

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The misspent effort reposed spontaneously, a prank worth ending with the dog letter: “GrrrrrrrR!”