2067 7 3
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i imagined myself & i was phlox saxifrage pompom ranunculus
poppy anemone ornamental onion rattlesnake red ribbon nerine
& i loved the painted tongue
& i wore the rattlesnake
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2067 9 8
|
My wife stood in the doorway and talked to the back of my head. “You really should talk to somebody about this,” she said.
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2067 15 9
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Outside I see the daytime moon, and it is faint as a fingerprint. My cousins have up-turned the biggest rocks and removed all the Sow bugs. The land is damp and red, and the trees feel wet to the center.
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2067 19 8
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YKK is a zipper manufacturer whose initials stand for Yoshida Kōgyō Kabushikigaisha. A boy told me (and I believed as a child) that YKK was my name in code.
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2067 6 1
|
Cold water shocked Ernest's face. The evening with Gracie had his nerves hot and popping. She was his fifth date and the closest to his memory of Sadie in college so far. He looked up at himself in the bathroom mirror with his mouth agape. Redness flooded…
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2066 0 0
|
Now coins used for wishing are not like coins used to purchase bread or carrots. Coins that have been invested with the magic of hopes and desires are special and have special properties. The difference between wishing coins and ordinary coins is very subtle.
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2066 6 3
|
the pollen of your kisses and the shouts of your love shaking the sky
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2066 24 11
|
whistling some blithering tune, trotting around the kitchen in his underwear with his ribs, a long row of meatless tragedies that screamed for something other than the meal he was making.
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2066 23 15
|
It's as if there are little men inside her head, wielding hammers.
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2066 13 12
|
They confess love for Karaoke and metal rock. They have purchased expensive Stratocasters and Zildjians.
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2066 5 4
|
The oven door topples off of its hinges as she kicks and climbs out. She growls and quickly slaps out her still smoldering sweater shoulder. Taking a kitchen chair by the back, she swings it over her head and shatters the window. The chair breaks into splinters as she…
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2065 13 6
|
We make our way into the Colosseum–excuse me, the Prince Spaghetti Colosseum–and take in the beauty of Italy’s national pastime; sadistic cruelty to wacko religious cults.
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2065 18 10
|
I miss my fire from the first three races
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2065 9 3
|
Mesmerizing, the night’s queer colors, the darkness given depth by the earth’s crystalline sheen, by a sky choked with a million fleeting prisms. In the woods surrounding the house another branch snapped, a gunshot loud crack. The echo lingered, cap
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2065 3 2
|
The woods. They say don’t wander too far into the woods, where those ghosts can’t hear you and the moonlight won’t trace you a path. In the black crowd of trees there’s something waiting. Don’t go to the where the siren is singing...
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2065 0 0
|
The deep breathing has helped. My heart rate is back down to a normal resting rate somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 to 60 beats per minute, about one solid thump every second like clockwork, a precision I can truly appreciate.
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2065 3 1
|
You never knew How to express What you didn't know You felt With your words You picked on You taunted You destroyed Did it help To feel yourself Did it work To disparage Those who were Innocent and young Blameless For living …
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2065 13 14
|
Alone on the platform, I waited for a train.
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2064 2 2
|
I saw life and beauty choking
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2064 16 7
|
He wears an old black tux, shiny at the elbows, and his gray hair has been styled and sprayed into a fragile tornado. On his lap sits a Chihuahua wearing a bridal outfit—veil and all.
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2064 14 8
|
Trying to hide, and yet, what continued to permeate was the shiny.
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2063 14 10
|
They were carried out / over shoulders of running soldiers / naked bodies pass
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2063 3 1
|
“Can't you tell when I get lonely?”, she asks. “No”, I say. It gets awkward because she wants me to know when she gets lonely. I don't give her the attention she wants without realizing it. She moves away and stares at me for…
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2063 2 1
|
I built a house in the middle of the ocean. I used sunlight for nails. Wind for wood. Stars for chandeliers, the moon for a doorknob.
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2063 3 1
|
“Tonight’s news begins with a Stone’s Throw exclusive. Intimate friends of hotel heiress Paris Hilton have confided that the talent-starved celebrity has agreed to marry Quaker Bob, longtime spokesperson and package icon for Quaker Oats cereal.
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2063 7 3
|
It was only later, much later, that we would discover that the war we were fighting was a war between ourselves. Melissa and I left the machine, with Carlton lost forever inside. We abandoned the warehouse. Our backs were scalded from the heat, and the hole in the…
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2062 12 11
|
Save the whales. Save the dolphins. Save the bored housewives. Save my hands, so often cupped over the sorrow in being alive. Save the beautiful made-up cherries of delight I feel everywhere in your presence. Save the sprawling…
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2062 23 19
|
Mack’s mind held a chandelier.
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2062 15 10
|
You wanted a love poem written just for you. / Here it is. Don’t look askance.
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2062 2 1
|
The punk boys are my favorite. They come with an attitude, the piercings and the chains and the baggy pants with their underwear hanging out. I’m a punk myself, I tell them. The long white hair and beard? They’re real, my friend.
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