Most read stories

More Child Fear

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Women with tremulous breasts. Going down the swimming pool drain.

Fifi Climbs To the Top!

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

With Ariel in Their Hands

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Sylvia Plath killed herself while her children slept upstairs, breakfast ready at their doors. Anne Sexton wanted to do it, but Sylvia got there first, making Anne just a little less remarkable, although she tried often enough, her death like a song put on repeat. …

He knows better

22012201 views1111 comments99 favs

It’s time to let her go.

Bitter Orange

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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.

The Krafft-Ebing Poems

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his dreams are filled / with aprons

17 Days

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Sometimes, under the gauze and yellow salves, I glimpse you...

Licking around the rim

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

Hundred Dollar Hit

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"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.

Ah'd love to kiss ya

22012201 views1414 comments1111 favs

“What was the line in the movie Dad?...

do you ever read writing?

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“Do you ever read writingand wish that it was about you?That you caused the epic fucking swell of emotions?That you were the only one capable of the rescue? Do you ever read writingand feel it so intensely?Like every word is an angry and desperate misfiring…

Two Writers play Modern Warfare

22012201 views1212 comments66 favs

I watch as my character falls lifelessly to the ground. I press the square button and I am instantly revived.

Saint Fred Rogers

22012201 views22 comments33 favs

I am remembering this day for all days. Remembering. All days. Always. This is the day you threw the TV out the upstairs window. I'm remembering. Always. This is the day that started with you shaking the toaster over me so all the crumbs fell out.…

Digging a Hole to the China Sea

22002200 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

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

Grace for Mao

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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.

Notes on a Failed Town

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Very few photos of the bear remain.

Love Songs for Kandahar

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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.

One Poem, Eight Rejections

21982198 views2525 comments1515 favs

Do you suppose you could make your female protagonist a salamander rather than a human?

Leave Off Doves

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Midway through the fall semester, an unremarkable girl in Professor Woody's Advanced Fiction workshop dyed her hair an unnatural shade of dark, changed her name to Tasmina, and turned in a story filled with made-up words.

Journey to Malta, from the novel "Grok"

21982198 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

This Is What Happens to the World in 10 Seconds

21972197 views1616 comments1313 favs

1. Everyone disappears.2. Stars map themselves.3. The moon fills her bathtub over and over. You can't watch it for too long or you go mad, shouting, "Just get in, get in!"4. The ghosts of certain broken poets stand under apple trees and lean their hands on the…

Fort Stark, New Hampshire

21972197 views88 comments55 favs

Sometimes you have to make sacrifices to get where you need to be.

Why They Cried: Ted

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Ted did not understand turn-of-the-century costume dramas, and because he didn’t understand them, he often referred to them as "chick flicks" or "English crap." Even when the principals were not British. Even when the principals were Winona Ryder.

A Body Divided, 2

21972197 views33 comments00 favs

I came down with polio on September 15, 1953, a mild, smoky day drawing close to autumn outside of Chicago — which also happened to be the exact date of my parents' twenty-first wedding anniversary. Only six months later the Salk vaccine was already b

The Singular Exploits of Wonder Mom and Party Girl (Excerpt)

21972197 views88 comments44 favs

“Can I?” Lily asked. I gave her a nod. She tore at the package with greedy fingers. As the paper fell away to reveal yet another self-help volume, Lily cocked her head in a gesture of confusion and curiosity. Following her gaze to the lipstick-red

Colin Powell's UN Clown Show

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Not that Dick Cheney gave one rusty rat's ass about what the UN might want. Fuck those poop countries!

Dear Joe,

21952195 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

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

Refill Please

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“Hello, this is Natalie Silverman, I’ve been tying to get my prescription filled for over a week. ... Maybe you recall, you did my brain surgery last spring? I’m sorry that there’s still a balance of over eight thousand dollars. I hope you don’t hold tha