Most read stories

The Grief Counselor

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At first she kept repeating "I don’t know why he's doing this" as if the cops thought she was mixed up in it somehow. When they convinced her that all she needed to do was talk to her brother and tell him to give himself up, she looked hopeless.

Winter Kills

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And on nights like those I conjure Martha's childhood, a little girl who could make the whole world fall in love with her, with those goddam big seashell eyes, enticing adults to fall into a blue-green sea that never ends, never promises survival.

Cabrito

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Mariposa, the skinny hound, crawls out from under the trailer

chicken little considers the sky again (a parable for our time)

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oh, sure i’m still running around like a heads-up/off/prophet/profit/fit trying to cut off my very own de/(con)instruction and all other sordid a•void•able & available /a-Babel-Trumpish towers of post & toastmodern doom/daze/haze

Gerade rechts zum Volkszimmer

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So, we are all healthy but suffering financially, not equally so, and the tendency to suffer financially has been caused by humbling ourselves to particular men. We take a quiz in moral values, phrased as a party game.

The Yellow Wonder

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Whenever I hear Adam Sandler's song, “My Piece of Shit Car”, it brings back memories. Notice I don't say fond memories. It brings me back just like the really bad backwash regurgitation flavor…

Conjured love

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Love heals. Lovers know this from the start, Yet they may not know with certainty What love is. Not that it matters especially When they find the magic within the power Of unfolding lust, Of redemption, Of unmitigated joy. There's a mutual…

Passing Past

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No one means to go that way, on an errand to the mall....

Samosely

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If you’re not dead yet, you’ll die of something.

The Apostate

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A crone dressed in black pours liquid from a bottle onto the egg. Whiskey. Gasp! The egg cooks before our eyes!

Secrets

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The one he liked best was a middle aged woman who didn't wear underwear. She had a terrific figure.

Before and After

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My heart beat someone up the stairwell.

Finger Weaving A Voyageur Sash

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Night's air awhirl, the sky shoots fireflies. Sometimes, she bleeds black arrows in her dreams.

No, You Don’t Know What I am Thinking

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Scratch his eyes out, flashed through Edgar's head, scratch his eyes out.

Subway Imitator

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The imitator’s segue to his sad life story was, “But what isn’t funny…”

Science Homework

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The difficulty of disabled parenting was predictable, but nothing could prepare me for having to say goodbye to my wife again on problem #7.

Saving Grace

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It essentially comes down to this: If you have nothing left but paper, all you can really use it for is wiping your behind if you’re in a jam.

I Wrote a Book

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About halfway through reading some book that was supposed to be some really deep shit, I decided to write my own book instead.

George

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he makes his way back / to the ocean, back to the popcorn, back / to the pinball machines

Almighty Pink Slip

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I fired God today. He wasn't showing up for work, slept through meetings, wrote ambiguous memos and killed too many innocents. Things just weren't working out.

Wild Dreams of Reality, 4

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It was days before Parker and I could even get up the nerve to look in each others' direction at the cafe. We kept trying to avoid the other's glance. But after a time things began to soften between us. I could sense it the day the tension began to eas

i am so fucking unsold

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i am wire i am wiredi am soaking fucking tiredi am sorry i am coldi am so fucking unsoldi am endlessi am statici am past lost time fanatici am wounded i am seethingi am bothered angry leaving.i am metal i am wateri am sister fucking daughteri am nothing i am lazyi am…

once upon a time in Sumeria

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Suddenly there was a crash of thunder, and they raised their eyes for the first time heavenwards. That was the beginning of what we call civilisation. - adapted from Prolegomena to Work in Progress — Stuart GilbertIt's the third year of the third millenium,…

Home in Biloxi

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Her father stuffed years worth of stories into the phone, a sort of begging: how the new dog rode in the golf cart and retrieved lost Pinnacles; how the garage’s rent was too expensive; how the doctor gave him new pills and how he had lost weight and cu

A Letter to the Global Warming

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I am mightily pissed. I was, like, waiting for you last night, at the Greenhouse cafe, and you stood me up. I should have listened to my mom who always advised me not to go on blind dates, but you are so popular that I just couldn't help myself. When I ca

Crisis Junkie

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  A lot of people are like this--they thrive on On conflict   My bartender is that way-she likes the Confrontation She wants to fight and argue and haggle And I never related to this In anyone Well, people are scared, or pretend to be Scared at the bar. Some…

The Making of Mermaids

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You ran so quickly for a while no one could find you. Finally, you sent us a report. You had retreated to the sea, you had your legs stitched together, you became a mermaid and were applying to join the school.

They Don't Call! They Don't Write! But at Least they Have a Dog Blog

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“I spent the best years of my life raising you, and now that you've grown, I never hear from you.” Sound familiar? That's the “Mom's Lament.” Mothers have been kvetching at their grown-up kids like this since the beginning of…

1987, What I wanted

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I wanted to watch, for as long as I could, until my innocence, like balloons, disappeared from view.

The Birds (2)

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The birds were stacked up in the branches of a pine tree behind the feeder. Several were sitting on the fence. “They’re massing,” she said.