Most recent stories

Caleb

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CALEBHe'd get up every day,don his clothes and tendto rote ablutions. He tried not to think too much.Because he knew what that would bring --the tethers he lost; failed causes,the last lover, who knew some things.Instead, he kept his eyes straight ahead,marked time,…

Another Irresolute Essay on Lit and Crit

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. . . we agree that formal standards for identifying literary merit exist and are capable of being discerned, not merely of being ascribed. —but is this itself true?

Boy's Worst Friend

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After dinner, I looked forward to taking a shower and cleansing myself of the day’s mishap. Cher had other plans.As I left the bathroom, Cher nipped me in the butt, taking my towel, skin, and blood with her. I remember writhing on the floor outside my sis

Spider and Fly Cafe

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I saw it coming from five feet

Until We See Again

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I saw a big dog By the side of the road I saw a small deer By the side of the road A little maroon water in a glass As I was driving home Under darkness With the wind that was under a rose New blood will fill the earth And we must lo

What We Know but Can’t Describe

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We know them just enough/ to recognize them when we find them.

Pancakes

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I’d look for a fork and quickly stab a piece of it and bite into it, feeling good about the finality of things.

Sea Bubbles

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"I don't know why you say good-bye, I say hello."--The Beatles Things fall from the clouds. Things fall from thefloor. Maybe through, maybe all the way.Everyone argues for their homeland.Someday I'd like to hold your hand. I'mstill dreaming. I hope it continuesto rain…

A Brief Conversation With A Man Who Fell Off a Cliff

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I asked him where he hurt and he said everywhere.

The World’s Food Shortage Problem is Solved with My Insect-Enlargement Gun!

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People of Earth, a better tomorrow has come. I’m near bursting with pleasure to report that the global community needn’t worry any longer about food shortages and famine and the like. Why? My patented insect-enlargement gun!

How Poets Die

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Mark Strandover decadesa steady diet of dictionenlarged his heartone day it just burstRobert Frosta crazy ideathat he couldbuild a wallwithout mortar tookpossession of his mindhe piled stoneon stone higherand higher untilthey toppled overcrushing him beneath Wilfred…

Transcription of Audio: Meeting with Miss Jewel Eppinette

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No one has touched me for a long, long time and I believe that is why I am dying. This is a notion that is new to me but it has persisted over the last few weeks and I believe I finally have apprehended the truth. There was a time, I remember all too well, when I might…

Good Deed Punished (Matthew IV)

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homelessness, you called the lie,

Carpe Diem

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And as you try to read, he appears. No, not in front of you, but somewhere just behind your eyes. You hear the sound at the end of an argument, just before the kiss; you see a shirt fall to the ground in late summer; you watch him read as his mouth

Drinking the Wild Virgin

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I really think we ought to be drinking The Wild Virgin again I remember having a beer once And feeling like a minor god, yes Just like you did So, now, listen to me: if she snores all night That’s one thing But if she screws the lights out

Politics

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These days, you seem to disappear like bread tasted and devoured

Domestic Sketches

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The cats sniff at the small opening,/ one by one, in a furtive casualness./ They think the outside air is sweet

To Do List

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Throw them up there but try to make it look tidy. Try to become a little bit paranoid, just enough that you slightly overestimate how much they think of you at all.

My History With Bras

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"Maybe so, but you have seen those photos in the National Geographic, right? Do you really want to risk it?" she demands and I sigh in defeat. I wake up at midnight, hot from too many blankets and pull my bra off through the sleeves of my shirt. I th

The Story You Wanted

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For I would draw a diagramTo signify the things I amBut I think you know--Todd Rundgren The door was opened before me. I know that's not a good way to start out on an adventure, but it is what happened to me. I didn't see any beckoning light, I felt a crazy urge, like…

Lunch Business

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It's lunch in the car time at 5:30 pm The car sits next to the mattress delivery truck in hope of receiving a blanket of shade

Everything the Traffic Will Allow

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there’s more to life than poontang but not when you’re sixteen and your hands are full of heavy breasts

The Summer Reading Program -- A Librarian Tells All!

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It's July, which, if you work in a public library, means that the Summer Reading Club is in full swing. The SRC used to be just for kids, to motivate them to read when school wasn't in session. But in recent years many libraries have expanded the program to include…

On the Bench (Matthew III)

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turn your face

Bookmark

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He opened an old book,flipping through its yellowedpages. A small piece of blue paperfell to the floor; he picked it up."Meet Tom at 4:00. Julius Bar."Standing there, Tom appearedas he sat down with the note,putting Tom back together:Tall, he remembered; Irish,green eyes…

Why I Love You

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I love you because your eyes are both crossed When you do it, because you’re focused On the inside of the universe I love you because You’re on a roller coaster Through life And I can ride along For the thrill of it I love you because

Sorrow

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It's not a funeral. Nobody to mourn over.

My dark job history

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Sometime in the late 60s when I was thirteen I had this paper route for the San Mateo Times.

My Boyfriend Believed in Aliens

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My boyfriend unequivocally believed in the existence of aliens. He was the Mulder to my Scully, though when I said so, he had no idea what I was talking about. I never understood how someone so E.T. obsessed could have missed 'The X-Files'.He would look skyward, eyes…

Serving

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patience is....