Most read stories

Slouching Towards Bethlehem

19681968 views66 comments55 favs

We didn't wear shoes in the summer, except for Sunday school and church. The soles of our feet were black and tough as shoe leather.

Poets Who Thrum

19681968 views1515 comments1313 favs

Poets who thrum jirble and thwack Poets who thrum eat quorn with raw swamms Poets who thrum are eristic (not shambolic) Poets who thrum deliciate unto kench when they freck

Blood By Pines

19681968 views55 comments55 favs

But all that they found at the top was bloody red spatters on pure white snowflakes. And beyond that footprints that got smaller and smaller until they disappeared completely into the spicy green pines.

Etymology

19681968 views33 comments11 fav

In every word there is both music and history. Music from the way sounds come into union with each other, and history in how they get there. There is form too, sure, but I am not a calligrapher. I'm a scribbler if anything. And so my sentences look mo

How Jellyfish Make Love

19681968 views22 comments22 favs

It was 1986 when I met you. We both lived on Decatur Avenue in a tank that had enough room for you, me, and all our fake plastic accoutrement. I was 30 years old -- really old for a jellyfish. Some people thought I'd die sooner. But I knew better. I was…

The Shreds of Flame

19671967 views00 comments00 favs

For years I watched behind the glass While merry parties purpled past But now the world’s a Solemn Mass And I can only think.

The winter I was going to meetings

19671967 views66 comments22 favs

It’ll die in there and the stairwell’ll stink for weeks, Greg says in the car. We’re quiet, considering that.

Breadfruit

19671967 views88 comments44 favs

... we both know how we go to fresh air like fish, gasping.

What if god was one of us?

19671967 views11 comment11 fav

an old Black woman, a sequined black cap poised on the left of her crown of black infused gray hair.  A gray wool shawl that seemed to perfectly match her hair's color wrapped her all the way down to her hips, where a battered pair of blue jeans rested

Marcel Unchained

19671967 views1717 comments1111 favs

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.

Tadpoles

19661966 views2525 comments1717 favs

Whole frogs are/ too difficult.

Memory Box

19661966 views00 comments00 favs

Soft voices in private, in the street, city noise violence disappears she blinks her eyelids and I can hear the lashes intertwine and pull clear.

My Recycled Soul

19661966 views11 comment00 favs

Forever Implies To my recycled soul That it is achievable If only I stretch myself Towards it

The Anniversary

19651965 views55 comments44 favs

.... The sun tears through the windshield as if it were an six-foot wide magnifying glass and for a moment it feels to them both as if they are in a manipulated universe of fire and ice, storm and heaven, as it does when the skies crack and spread open a

Bad Boys, Bad Boys, 1

19651965 views11 comment11 fav

My wife and I were sitting at the bar at Brennan’s down on 4th Street one night, drinking too much without eating. Geary had convinced us to come down there with him, for two reasons. One, to give us the lowdown on where to stay and what to do in New Yo

Like Counting Raindrops

19651965 views22 comments11 fav

When I glance at the bedside clock I realize that we have been making love in one way or another for nearly three hours now. I am filled with a certain secret smugness that I am still going strong. It has been a long time since I’ve done anything quite li

Three Poems in March, after Baca

19651965 views88 comments55 favs

I could love them all, your people, / Learn their differences, speak their tongues, / When there is no one there to hold you / But me, my arms would be wide enough / To hold armies of your need. Do not forget.

Oh, Dada!

19641964 views11 comment00 favs

Daddy? Yes, hun. What do you think about life? Did you ask your mother? I'm asking you. (lowers newspaper) Well, (squinting eyes) life gives you so much pumpkin. ! and (like a whip) and..? (brows almost touching the hairline)…

Arcana Magi - c.24: Desperation

19641964 views00 comments00 favs

Oryn woke up in her desk. Sweat trickled from her forehead. Staring at her notepad, with her latest calculation, she forgot to go home. Her thoughts of Alysia calmed for now, but still lingered from her dreams.

Liebe Grüße

19641964 views22 comments00 favs

Left, I see parkland and cyclists and sun. Right: picnic blankets, naked men and lunchtime assignations.

Me. You. Love.

19631963 views66 comments55 favs

In my own case, before Ellen, of course there was someone else. She—well, she was someone who I felt as if I’d always known and always would. And I think she felt the same about me.

The Zilch Belches Out Its Own National Anthem To the Trendy Crowds

19631963 views2525 comments55 favs

" Not a day goes by/ that isn't stabbed with common sorrow"--Maurice Manning Crazy's alright by me if it's a harmless plea for some little sanity, or unavoidable by birth but it just won't do for tricks. Like say I go over there right…

FOR SCIENCE!

19631963 views22 comments00 favs

According to the weatherman's morning forecast it was supposed to be a dark and stormy night. Unfortunately for Doctor Von Übel the weather had other things in mind...

Neighbors

19631963 views22 comments11 fav

“Hear that?” asks my wife Amy. Books in hand, we relax on our flagstone patio. A shaft of late-day sun borrows through the maples' leafy canopy and deposits a dazzling, sunlit pool on Amy's lap. …

One Bag of Popcorn

19631963 views99 comments22 favs

“Dad’s a dick,” my sister said. I nodded. He threw $20 on the candy counter for one small bag of popcorn and told the girl to keep the change.

Red Left Hand

19631963 views55 comments33 favs

"I see a child's bicycle swarmed by bees. A stolen oil painting of a helicopter...no, no, that ain't it. Wait. A high school basketball coach will hang himself from a bridge you often think about. This man, now, he's a Navajo Indian.

Playing with Fire

19631963 views66 comments22 favs

Six sentences

Acceptance is to her a phenomenon

19631963 views1414 comments77 favs

You were given blame for action as experience by cause and effect now. If you take apart blame and even forgiveness is too rigid. She thinks of that purpose as to give men sexual destiny.

Punk

19621962 views2222 comments1616 favs

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. …

Animal Park (Part I)

19621962 views00 comments00 favs

“The robin is the one. …