Most read stories

My History With Bras

21562156 views1010 comments99 favs

"Maybe so, but you have seen those photos in the National Geographic, right? Do you really want to risk it?" she demands and I sigh in defeat. I wake up at midnight, hot from too many blankets and pull my bra off through the sleeves of my shirt. I th

A sense that something has happened

21562156 views1414 comments88 favs

hunting after dark,/ in the quiet they seemed to appear/ with every new poem I read, each new workshop, some hunting carried on/ by both animals.

Tyler is learning about girls.

21562156 views1414 comments33 favs

Tyler has a Mars bar in his jeans pocket. It’s warm and soft. He tries to insert it.

Bitter Orange

21552155 views00 comments00 favs

A poison bouquet of Merlot and brown floor muck bloomed in Seth’s nose. It’s one thing to sniff a freshly decanted red and another thing to shower in it.

Getting Put On

21552155 views55 comments33 favs

There are times when I run out of places to sleep. I thought my whole life that god gave up on me. The newspaper bin is where I go when I'm desperate. In the center of town there's a large bin for recycling newspapers behind…

Wedded Bliss

21552155 views11 comment11 fav

Alaina paced around in the green room. She couldn't believe she had agreed to do this. Her friends had told her it would be an excellent idea. How can agreeing to marry a total stranger on national television a decent idea, let alone an excellent one? "Oh Lain, it'll be…

Hundred Dollar Hit

21552155 views66 comments11 fav

"My god," Toni said, bending over and tapping her head gently against the counter in fake anguish. "His ass in those jeans. Jesus. I should be young and lucky like you." Toni tapped her cigarette ash into the coin tray.

Po-cash

21552155 views1515 comments77 favs

“Black is up, red is down,” I said, knowing he turned to pleasant memories of lawbreaking when he felt discouraged. I asked him to meet me for coffee. He said he hadn’t bought a coffee in a year.

Dear Joe,

21542154 views88 comments77 favs

Walk alone at night, quietly. Pause for eye contact with raccoons and night cats, your drunk self, and lights in the graveyard. Don't apologize for it in the morning. Instead of the shame you feel for one time acting selfishly and chasing a future, say…

Eight States Away

21542154 views2626 comments2020 favs

He boarded the wrong plane. (Hey, it could happen. Maybe not after 9/11, but certainly before)

Digging a Hole to the China Sea

21532153 views2323 comments1313 favs

Could sampans fall upward, sailing from the bottom of the Earth? If so, which way would their sails bend—up, or down? And would the strange China Sea follow suit? Would salt water geysers spurt from the hole we dug, flooding the streets of Seattle?

Contentment

21532153 views1919 comments1313 favs

On the bed he tickled her until she was crying with laughter. And then the tickles became caresses, the fingers, lips.

The Krafft-Ebing Poems

21532153 views2727 comments1818 favs

his dreams are filled / with aprons

Banana Republic

21532153 views1212 comments1010 favs

I would love to believe that this poem might sell a poetry book

Notes on a Failed Town

21532153 views44 comments55 favs

Very few photos of the bear remain.

Grace for Mao

21512151 views2626 comments1313 favs

I greatly enjoyed imagining each wonton was one of my personal enemies and then biting it in half and pretending I could hear it screaming piteously as I chuckled and dragged out the chewing.

The Brother

21512151 views99 comments55 favs

I guess it’s extremely difficult to be a decent human being in all aspects of your life.

Caffeine-Fueled Revelation Machines

21512151 views55 comments33 favs

So she leans over the patio table like that model in that magazine ad and then takes a sip of her blended coffee drink as if a director had said to pretend the straw is a penis. As if this director only just shouted, “And you're a dirty, dirty girl, and

Sinister Age of the Draft

21502150 views3939 comments1414 favs

The so-called good, a weak but whiny lot, who actually clung to that abstract of "justice for all," would tattle to Mrs. Pufry...Mzzz Puffy, she hit me...Mzzz Puffy he said the bad word...Mzzz Puffy, I gotta go...Mzzz Puffy, Thomas is hanging in the cloak

Possum Woman

21502150 views33 comments00 favs

They always referred to her as the possum woman back home. She scoured the streets just as the sun fell into deep slumber behind the sentinel, sun tanned shoulders of the mountains encircling small town anywhere.

A Midsummer's Nightmare

21492149 views33 comments22 favs

"So, is this the datgum exit?" "Grumphfr exit fregerrock." (This response means either yes, it is, I told you that ten miles ago, or, no it's not, I told you that ten miles ago, depending if it’s the right exit or not.)

Love Songs for Kandahar

21492149 views77 comments55 favs

You worry that the mullahs suspect us, but that cannot be. We never touch in public. You weep and I shake when a neighbor knocks on the door.

Fifi Climbs To the Top!

21492149 views44 comments44 favs

Fifi is one piece of work, from the Ann Coulter Tits-And-Ass Rattlesnake School Of Broadcasting Venom And Bullshit Like Goebbels...

Steady Keel

21492149 views55 comments22 favs

He stands. Shoes for dashing, and he could dash, if the audience would stand for it, through one of two exits, beneath one of three wreaths. This year, the year of the Millennium, the wreaths seem dark and Germanic. The stage seems like a Great Hall set for a solitary…

Licking around the rim

21482148 views33 comments11 fav

Sure, it was a hot day, but the driver was in the middle of a driving lesson!

A Sunday Afternoon in Paris

21482148 views2424 comments1616 favs

He would lean on his window sill in the evening and watch the whores. They wore gaudy clothes and too much makeup.

London Fog

21482148 views33 comments11 fav

I stumbled out of the Ten Bells pub, still a bit tipsy from the absinthe, but had a clear vision of what I wanted to have happen this night. The air was cold on my rosy cheeks, so I shielded my face…

Journey to Malta, from the novel "Grok"

21482148 views22 comments00 favs

The journey to Malta would take almost four days. Both men, with knapsacks and sleeping bags on their backs, stepped eagerly onto the train in Zürich. A whistle blew and they were off. In his knapsack, Grok had brought pictures of his family

Three Poems, One for Each Eye

21472147 views1818 comments1010 favs

1. a bone to pick"It seems to be accepted nowadays more than ever that killing,individual and mass killing,is the order of the day;it is accepted."--Henry MillerWhy can't you leave well enough alone just long enough for it to make its own miraculous escape…

Arcana Magi - c.12: Danica Leandros, Sentinel of Seiryuu

21462146 views00 comments00 favs

Of course, there was one love Danica had in her heart that stood above all those luxuries, magic.