1851 10 8
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a mid-life crisis in 55 words
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185110
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It's possible I was having an acid flashback or some kind of semi-conscious when I opened the door of #3.
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18511310
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And here you are. Before your time. Behind the glass.
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185194
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Every morning, the children dig holes for their parents. This is both necessary and beneficial: the kids need to dig and the parents have to be buried.
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185054
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When she was eleven, Margaret still believed in mermaids. She would fasten the neon diving rings that her mother gave her to her ankles and swim around in the pool for hours. By the end of the afternoon, with chlorine-swollen skin she would wince as she…
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18502812
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At some point, we will have to shoot them/
through the eyes and skull and heart
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185086
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My natural blonde hair is no longer sultry. Instead of a Dietrich look, I now assume a dead on impression of Bette Davis in "What Ever Happened to Baby Jane" some mornings.
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185023
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Once Mom finally came to terms with the fact that my brother was gay, she became convinced he was a serial killer. “He has all the signs,” she told me as she trimmed my hair. “Signs?” I asked, watching her in the…
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185075
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I think they've always been together, talking amongst themselves about whatever is happening around them. A part of me wishes they'd walk into the cave and disturb whatever is burning it from the inside out.
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185040
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Remember me? I am the large, dented acorn you threw at your brother, Ken, during the huge acorn war of 1969. You were thirteen. He was eleven. And the entire neighborhood was in your backyard that day. Steve, Jack, Jerry, Tom, Dan, Jeff, Drew. A bunch of the kids…
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184987
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His mouth is a flesh cave where a grizzly slumbers and winter is the blank page of my face.
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184974
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184921
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The diner was half filled with the loose ends of humanity that stayed up until five in the morning. We picked a booth by the window. The light in the diner was a dingy yellow, and the seats were that lobster-red vinyl that could only have been installe
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18491711
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I would be proud to be your house rabbit. I make this case: I will listen flop-eared close to your every concern
and exhultation. If I doze off nudge me. I wake quickly.
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18491613
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The boy giggled, splashing his father and howling at the cold.
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184923
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18482814
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You are terrified. You light/
the autopilot light and trust//
the small machineries of self/
to land things safely,
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1848198
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It lies in rusting riot
of shadowed days.
Flying high its emblem wings,
forever stalled.
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18483820
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They cut the tall specious tree storms snapped the night in two or three. At times
they pause most piously to count each ring of truth, drive nails into the stiff cathartic spine, divine if this unseasoned cigar topiary agrees with its own everlasting te
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184800
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If anyone should wonder whether a purveyor of weekly ghost tales on television ("A World Beyond", which I host, was rated number six in fall of '55), might come to feel undone by a case of extradimensional foulness, they shall herein find their answer.
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18472216
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My mother used to say she'll be just like you and you‘ll deserve it. I was a Punk Rocker. A rebel. Emily worries about things like grades and sports. She's on the soccer team. I got stoned under the bleachers. Emily, is a good kid. …
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18471711
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Street mime in white face and white gloves, trapped in invisible box. Tip jar empty. Marcel's solo-dancing the tango now, teeth clenching ephemeral rose. Passersby pass him by.
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184700
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Staring at her horribly disfigured face, I envied her.
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1846136
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Less than a hundred adults remain, predominately women, along with several dozen children of various ages. Most of their men were killed in a territorial war six moons previous.
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184620
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. . . not if I have anything to do with it.
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18451511
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It could as well be late night infomercials/
saturating the screen//
with medieval looking exercise machines
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184587
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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…
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1844134
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--How's the wriiting business? How about that thing you' was workin' on..."Gawain's Green Nights?"
--Yeah, well, I'm kind of off the soft-core...
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184400
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I am warming up the Hotel Hugo courtesy shuttle van when Victor the front desk manager comes striding out waving his arms asking me why I haven't backed up yet. Victor says I'm always in my own world when I should be paying attention to the work at hand,
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184462
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You longed to rip off her butterfly wings and watch her scream in agony. You ached to carve the steel from her eyes.
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