Most read stories

To My First Crush

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But I came back around, after Robert Kennedy got shot, with one hand up your skirt and the other on the gear shift...

We're All Guys Here

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The doorbell rang while Ron was masturbating.He closed his eyes tight. Tried to hold the image of Lori bent over the arm of the couch. No use. It was gone. Ron sighed, then levered the recliner down. Tied on the terry-cloth robe Lori had given him. He kicked aside an empty…

Danger Above, Danger Below

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And you know that notion just goes to show...

Always Vera

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“The price of everything's gone up,” I say. “But I don't have to buy you chocolate if it's costing too much.” She says nothing and bends her head again, gnarled hands slowly breaking a family-sized chocolate block into pieces.

Shine

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I was afraid of needles and ponds of water and I was transfixed by both.

Mr. Natural and a Little Opium On the Side

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It was a sloppy little factory town that could be beautiful, but never bothered trying. Sits on a big lake. More bars than churches, and too many of both. Racist. We hated anybody who didn’t believe in white Jesus

Re: “oo===D---o-}-<,” Fiction Submission

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Fake letter, 55 words.

Italy, 1990

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She...learned the ways of men, especially foreign men, who eyed her mother even as they passed around pictures of their children, wallet-bound photographs that included their reluctantly smiling wives.

On Writing about Velveeta

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You are fishing in a coffee cup. (Your fishing pole is a record player.)

Let me tell you about the smell of the rain.

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You are lonely. Let me tell you about the smell of the rain.

Broken Bulbs - Chapter One

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And here I am again. I chew my nails. I tap my foot. I chew my nails. I sweat. I bleed. My nose bleeds. It drips. I drip. I'm dripping through my chair.

Decrucifixion

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"Isn't it time to remove the nails, and put Jesus to rest once and for all," Mary asks.

"You Go"

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You like your life. Ducks march in a row. You've reached a certain age but you're strong. Healthy. You've got food, clothing, shelter. You have insurance and important papers. You don't have a man in your life, and you admit— Admit nothing. The…

Soon, and for the Rest of Your Life

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. . . and the last thing you’ll smell will be new-cut pine.

The Heart Does Not Know What It Cannot Have

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“I take him to see all those sexy movies,” she said, “because it puts the passion back in him. I love what he does to me when we get back home after those movies.”

Fifty-One

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Several friends—hers and his—hung around the edges of their marriage, and it would be naive to rule out the possibility of a few stray affairs. The thought didn’t anger him; on the contrary it amused him as if it were some trivia question, the answe

Self Portrait as a Drowned Man

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The light, oblique and waning, filters through butcher’s paper to reveal a body suspended in death but never decomposing.

Demolition Derby

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ornery women / in tall hats, suspender dads, kids deformed with / ribbons

Spring Cleaning for Poets

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“Can you do something about that those four stanzas of three lines each at the bottom of the basement steps?” my wife asked. "That's a villanelle I'm working on."

Go Yonder and Worship, part 1

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In the blue of the yard the twins boil and scrape, twisting about beneath the sycamore tree.

Nothing in the World (an excerpt)

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All night the moon had watched him, and he’d been unable to return its stare. Finally there was sunlight, and Joško took up his rifle and rucksack. He had trouble keeping his balance at first, but gradually his legs steadied.

Fake Letter: From Your Gay Son

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Dear Mom, You told me the connection between a mother and her son is like no other connection. You carried me for nine months. You scheduled visits with the doctor; you thought and discussed and re-thought and re-discussed with dad what my name would be; you…

Naked (a translation)

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His body echoed in the mirror/ cracked into distant images

to day

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I turn my head. Time starts running.

Fiction with Teratoma Preserves

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In Nebraska, we found a dead man lying between the furrows of a field. He’d been there awhile in the heat and the sun, the only shade provided by a cloud of flies. The dead man lay on the ground, decaying, disappearing into the dirt:

So You Want to Be a Poet

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You’re the girl that would sneak out to poetry readings instead of parties, watching fierce semi-bearded men reading their poems from hand-stapled zines.

April 2nd: National Have Sex With An Ugly Person Day

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Let's be honest. Ugly people have an uphill battle in this culture. From the time they slide out of their ugly mothers they stand at the plate with two strikes.

Haze

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I slide my hand under the sheets. It’s cool there. An impression. This is where she would be.

Oh, Clyde. I must be your Bonnie.

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This is the best kind of crime scene. Spattered like gore from gunshots, I'm left covered in trace evidence.

Autumn Offering

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You may gather from me the spring of my youth