Most recent stories

How To Profit As Copper Becomes The New Gold

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We have no more leaders, only rulers who live in another country. I don't ask why my cousin's hand is bandaged, what he's been burning, what's tarped in his truck.

Arcana Magi Divine

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Amyra pressed her hands on the brick wall and rubbed it. She thought about hanging something on there, but she did not have the tools to make a hole. In fact, the thought of having a hole in the wall would be enough.

On Writing about Velveeta

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You are fishing in a coffee cup. (Your fishing pole is a record player.)

Aloha

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It’s a little known fact that eels are often lost in translation – only the spotted variety, not the striped or the common and certainly not the electric.... I think about that lovely hippie girl and her knowledge of eels, sometimes.

Break Time in the Army Corps of Engineers Mascot Lounge

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The Army Corps of Engineers spent $92,000 in federal stimulus money on costumes for mascots such as Bobber the Water Safety Dog.

Hurricane Shutters

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The thing that really gets you about the house is the hurricane shutters. They're up already, even though it's the end of May, because Buck's uncle is back in Rhode Island for the summer and he's prepped the house on Key Largo like Armageddon is coming.

Prairie Yields

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The river’s not/ a river but/ a FEMA map/ of flooding probabilities.

Dirty Aubade

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We could kiss under the elder tree, even though it was forbidden, even though we were drowned by the noise of the river and nothing we said was right

I’m Not a Needy Film Project

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Thanks to the popular funding platform Kickstarter, I am finally getting my life in order with the help of generous people like you. Dating in this economy, without a job, is surprisingly expensive.

Breasts and Pickups

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Two giant greasy hands were working those breasts hard, squeezing and tugging and pulling. She didn't holler.

Melancholy Wrecks

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In the weeks that followed she told haunted stories...reaching out to touch her reflection and finding it clammy, a summer of unending menstrual thunder, a year she spent somewhere safe with polished metal mirrors.

Phantasmagoria

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I sit in my chemise like a forgotten rag doll on the stool before my vanity. My body is postured towards nothing in particular, my gaze keeps returning to vacant; it’s far preferable to any fixed sight it could find.

And You--And You--And You

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“Good to see you, old man,” Greg said. He was like that, an investment banker, a latter-day Tom Buchanan without the polo ponies, self-consciously fusty.

Old Photo, 1948 or so

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I’m maybe only four. Not smoking cigarettes found in street gutters yet. That will come the next year, when I’m five. Maybe when I’m six, and Andy’s five, my pal from across the street. That’s my tricycle parked behind this pack of kids that look to be ne

The Cool Report

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I didn't go to China, however. I would have gone there in debt wearing their clothing. I was afraid to owe even $4,000 (what I still owe) living overseas.

ExsanguiNations

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leaches fatten-up

Sphynx Clara

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A brick from the parapet splat down later as I was applying a bitter healing powder, made from the seeds of watermelons, to my raw tongue.

Double or Nothing

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Wednesdays were humiliating. Third graders had to bring in twenty-five cents for class dues. If you forgot, the teacher would write your name on the board and it would stay there until you settled your debt. My family could afford the weekly quarter; the problem was…

The Hiders

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The Kharal kept us safe, we knew, kept the colony functional in the oft belabored effort that was living our small, human lives surrounded by death, for in their ring of constant invisible protection, when they did not come, we thrived. It was not as tho

The Tale Of Brave Grinelda

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Once upon a time in the days of old There lived a poor tailor who- I am told- Did brag that his daughter Spun straw into gold!

68 & Riverside

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Martin met Siena in the elevator, carrying two brown bags of groceries. She asked him to press the button for floor eight. As they rose, Martin fixed his eyes on the display as it changed numbers: G, 2, 3… and so on.

Life After Death

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If opposites attract, that might explain it, Doreen and I. Conjugally blissed through thick and thin. Forty some odd years. Since June of sixty five.

Tsunami

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Tsunamis are quiet at first: not one big wave but many small injustices, so chaotic all the pressing all the weight of the noise, like a stone holding you under.

Carnival Beach

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Galloping people, tangled in ballets of hot love, weaving in and out, making a canvas of it.

Prophetstown

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The elders of the town will tell you that as soon the prophet mill arrived everything went to Hell. Before the process was streamlined, prophets used to be grown organically in the community. They popped up only where the ground was tilled and a prayer was planted. They…

Confetti

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We go in gently at first, skimming over the first few swells and dropping speed, but then we pitch hard, tail over. The windshield holds. I think of Lily. I think of the baby. And I see my life.

Mud

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I told him that the beehive he had for a brain was overpopulated and that he couldn’t seem to go for one minute without desperately thinking that I was going to leave him when I’m sure I gave him no evidence to that effect at all

Attempting Integration, Duchamp Descends to the Killing Floor

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Slice the moment into/ free body diagrams/ of elegant simplicity

The Gratitude of Bones

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During war, as in any terrible time of upheaval, burials are merely quick words and a scattering of dirt, if the dead are lucky.

Confidence

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one day the words will form an order, one day the words will make a rhyme, one day the words will make a meaning