Most read stories

Hattie Hanratty Does the Previously Unthinkable

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"Hattie? What are you doing?" Bosley asked, the quaver in his voice an indication of an impending erection.

December 15, 2012

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Already, I can see that, whenever Harold moves, some of his soul escapes, like an accidental exhalation, like breath on powder.

... and I liked it!

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... red lipstick shiny in the bar's light, raven-colored hair spiky and toussled. Jen opened her mouth to say something, stickiness of her cherry Chapstick separating with her lips ... and the girl leaned in and started kissing her.

Pentagon City

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I had been in bed for a couple of days and by this I mean sleeping for fifteen or sixteen hours at a time. I don’t think that I believed in God anymore. I no longer knew how to stay awake.

Smoke

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On his last day of high school Jackie York woke up to the smell of burning books. He didn't know it was his last day of high school. He did know the smoke coming through his rusty window screen was book smoke.

Meaningless conversations

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“I wanted coffee, not art. That’s why I came here, and the coffee here isn’t even that good. We should have gone to the place across town, their lattes are the best.” “How do you determine the best coffee? Do you think they have judges that go from sto

FOR SCIENCE!

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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...

Yes You Can--Buy My Book of Bad Poetry

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America has given birth to many great poets--Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, Muhammad Ali--but why should talented people have all the fun?

Arcana Magi Memorial - c.1

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Azure spent these years learning how to harness the four elements and find the four creatures that shackled her.

Joe for Town Council

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“I heard your dad took out the Dairy Queen drive-thru,” said Pat.

The Perils of Open Hand

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There are worse things than getting your ass kicked by a 12 year old Puerto Rican kid. This was exactly my thinking as he stood over me, his pre-pubescent screams sounding like a baby Bruce Lee, preparing to finish me off.

Seattle November

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He ate husks of bone and old paper scraps with yesterday's headlines, blowing down the street like tumbleweeds now at four o'clock in the morning.He wrapped himself in an old army coat against the November winds as he tramped back and forth, back and forth, up the ten…

Down Here I Drink Alone

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The tapestry of time gets another stitch. The countdown clock rolls forward. The whole crazy picture gets a little bit clearer.

Working Title: "Third Persons"

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#1 MISCELLANEOUS NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: What kind of person would the author’s daughter, Gracie, become? That things didn’t look bright for her future was an understatement: Mother: alcoholic, dead at age 25 from puking her brains out; Father: m

Who you are

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a mid-life crisis in 55 words

HOMELESS OUTSIDE THE CHURCH

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Only the occasional kindness of a stranger,// The curve of his back, a slope rushing past me,// Is luminous, the coin pressed in my hand . . .//// And yes, I beg.//// I open my palm// As Jesus did.//

When I Met Ian Curtis

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Okay, no freaking out. I mean, this isn't a suicide note. This is suicide fiction.

Mona

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Doc and I talked for several hours. When I told him Mona was pregnant, he turned his head and looked at me. “Who's the father?” he asked. Don't know, I said. Mona didn't know, either.

Curtains

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She wants her mother back and all I can give her is this—over and over. She doesn't want my mouth, wants no kissing anywhere even. Just this. Like this—quiet and rough. Quiet because her stepfather is napping in the bedroom next to…

Sociopathic Medicine

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True love may last forever, but the most I've ever gotten out of a lab assistant is two years, five months, three weeks, twelve days, and fifteen hours. And he was the exception.

A Little Fishing

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Len and I sit on Harpo's porch, drink beer and gab. It's hot, even for July. Len and I joke and laugh, and Harpo stares off into the middle distance.

Safety First

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I am not a gun, but I think I may have pulled a plastic movie trigger in some kind of real world action before, accelerated, pivotal scene, one way or another before, this new frame came into its paranoid view .You see? I am not a plastic water bottle,but I…

Becoming an Author

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"good luck, and be assured acceptance for representation or publication is based on different criteria at different agencies and we are sure you will yet find someone mentally deficient enough to give your book a shot."

Remarkable Depths of Semantic Ambiguity

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Thank you for submitting your epic poem I, I, I for consideration. While we are encouraged that you have relented from the ruthless self-endictment you affected so unconvincingly in your previous entry, Why Am I...

The Magician

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He now knew the impossible to be possible.

April

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A riot of greens

This Girl in That Shirt

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At first when she walked in, I thought she looked like a wet dog. Then after a minute, I’m trying to wrap my mind around how perfect she is.

Something Strange There Is

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Maybe God couldn’t find His bifocals, and that’s why my check for ten million hasn’t shown up yet. Maybe a stray dog in heaven ate my check. Maybe God went bankrupt like everyone else. Okay, so maybe at the end of life I’ll balance my checkbook. I do

hendecasyllabic moon

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that moon does not think (unless mineral thoughts) . . .

The Undertaker's Son

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You would never see me the same again. You'd always be peaking at me from behind your mother's apron.