Most recent stories

An Orb for a Better World

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Max sighed. Solving for x was boring, so mind numbingly boring that he didn't notice the flickering blue light hovering in his room. It crackled and popped, growing until a shimmering rectangle stretched from floor to ceiling.A hand pushed out from the rectangle, and a…

Professor University

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Is this a tenure track position?

Secure

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This is the Minuteman tine/ of the three-tined fork// we can stick into the modern world/ when it’s done-- a MAD triad.

The Song in the American Soul

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They are riding through the wild onion of life One layer at a time Turning the world inside out Looking for the unusual patterns Inside the gaping muscle of space With its heart-pounding unnatural heat

This Outhouse Reeks

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The bathroom had exposed rusty pipework, A minty lemonade smell, Ice in the urinal, And a wall of stone-cold mirror. She put some lipstick on, but it looked fake under the lint-covered bulb dangling overhead. She wiped off the lipstick but…

Steps

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He deplaned Air France flight 9 from JFK to Charles de Gaulle airport at quarter past noon.

Mauthausen

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I was feeling a bit introspective. I was busy in my own mind assembling the history of the place and getting ready for the visit. I was naturally not someone who would cluster up with a bunch of people I had just met and had arrived to participate in this

Drought

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Everything is at sixes and sevens.

Forever Four-Eyed

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I'm a librarian. A reader. I identify as a four-eyed person. I've always worn glasses. I got my first pair in the second grade. It was a miracle! The blurry world I'd inhabited all my life suddenly came into focus. I could see the blackboard! I could read street signs! I…

The Princess of Fillmore Street

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So she started sneaking into people’s houses in the middle of the night. She’d just sit in the kitchen for an hour or so, and just feel the peace. Never took anything or got into anything. Just sat there silently.

On being offered a seat on the Bart train

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Remember when I entered a room and turned heads is my youthful charm a sputtering fire in the hearth

The Dolly Boys

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I have a fascination with Dickens and London and this was inspired by my next novel.

Alice White Loves Me Because

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She loves you when your words leave her dirty, semi-transparent, at times, overexposed.

Anonymous Hackers

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A university student who triggers a flash mob in the heart of Silicon Valley to prove her hacking creds finds herself in deep trouble when the colorful members of Anonymous Hackers prove their hacking creds to her.

Roadside Attraction

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There is a certain stage of sobriety among men who drink every night. In that stage, they are their best selves: they write novels, fix cars, care for their young. Then they change.

Hobby Lobby

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In human rights, a man and a woman may marry and bring forth a family. It is a civil right in the U.S. but not a human right (as far as I know) to raise a child singly without the knowledge of the other parent.

Gaza Suite

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Tender bodies sizzle on the grill.

The Elevator

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The man and the woman looked at each other almost shyly. The man flicked his eyes away self-consciously and looked outside, seeing the clouds in the distance, the smaller buildings…

Cheesecake

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Eric was born with three testicles.

Fifteen

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“We could dooble date,” he said.

It's a Beautiful Banana Moon

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and I can't help it if it is. I know it won't stay that way for long, but for now that's all I've got to work with, shining in my window, made of all eight fingers and a couple of thumbs. But the latest pushy words still want to give…

Working Girl

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Suddenly a hand shot up on the other side of a hedge. “I’ll have one of those!” cried someone who remained invisible.

ok, ok, so I concede

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some answers are enough to make you cry or laugh yourself to death

A Loser, Either Way

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Although I'm twenty years older than her, my girlfriend has called me "jailbait" for the past year and a half because she says the only way to stop having to share me is to kill my wife..

Dramatic Effect

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You wanted transcendence, wanted height, danger, the tracks blurred into murky distances behind and in front of you. You slipped, reached for it, starlight shining in your eyes, something you didn't have when I held your hand. We didn't fold the…

Chief Seattle

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Neighbors trade novels through windows

Move and Pause

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On a Saturday I flew from murky air. My wings grown weak, I stole away from plundered nest, casual stings, and skillful barbs. In family's fold, I perch.

In Passing

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I'm not hungry now The darkness swallows me as they eat. I'm starving now With a pain I can't defeat.

Brief Requiem for the Twentieth Century

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The crumbling meccas/ gnaw/ Each fiscal year’s quota of blood and bone,

Ranger

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“What. Is. That?” Sid asked, staring at the shaggy ball of fur sitting in the living room. Its tongue hung out of its mouth and its tail beat against the carpet.“This is Ranger,” his mom said. “I don't know what breed he is, but he's a sweetie…