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His Laugh is My Yellow (or explaining skin color to a six-year-old boy)

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Max is the color of burnt caramelized sugar the sweet crust that decorates our bright enameled pots.

Things being said

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Things are still being said in a world that sounds like rough bows and straight slicing arrows communicating with (smashing like fists) a poor pool of tired animals. There must also come a time to surprise these same cruel machines…

Best Place To Eat in Town

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Often I eat lunch at the hospital. The cafeteria may be the best place to eat in town.

A Natural Consequence of Things

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Belief is a hammer, like saying the mind is a piece of iron.

Constable Pulce and the Sunny Dystopia

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Alessandro was no ordinary demon (what demon is?), insofar as he had Constable Pulce's number. In demonly fashion he had Pulce's number in a way Pulce himself did not.

The Invitation

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The poet could not speak of himself but only of the gradations leading toward him and away. ~ Mark Strand

Darryl, The Biography

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"I was born very far from where I'm supposed to be. And so I'm on my way home."--Bob Dylan I don't owe you anything. If I'm a recluse what does it have to do with you? I have the right to be poor. Some things cannot be explained away by letters that…

the weather past where roads end

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a soft wooden clatter, wind-battered reeds/bound to the banks of ditches rank,/ill-purposed waters slide into low swamps/whose waters into rivers seep and crawl.

Unsent

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this is where we end -- the exorbitant eye of forgotten days.

1 am some October night

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if I get electrocuted—maybe I’ll electrocute back

Nepenthe

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Alas, the wind, the rain/ and plate tectonics take temples,/ fire and sediment papyrus and clay,

There are Grandmas and there is my Grandma.

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Last night Grandma got her walker stuck in the snow almost up to her tits. I feel the mark of a dutiful grandson is to come to her aid. And I always do. Even though she usually gets back home at 2 00 a.m. — or maybe 3 — sometimes she's late and we worry but I…

Stretching to Understand

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You looked like someone I didn't want to know. I guess that's why I got in the car that night. My penchant for self-destruction was aroused by your black nail polish and the lavender circles under your eyes. You looked like someone that could hurt me, yeah, that's why I got…

And then the Heat Broke

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She did not know Robert’s skin was sliced and bruised from the twelve pound ball and chain locked to his ankle for sixteen hours that night.

Flood

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My mother's afraid the dog will drown. It's raining and our street is flooding and the dog is standing on top of his doghouse. My mother is pregnant. I can stand beneath her stomach and not even see her face. I watch her from the kitchen window. She's shoeless. She holds…

Fatherhood 101

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The instructor moved over to the whiteboard and wrote in big block letters “FOOTBALL” and then crossed it out. “You should just never treat your newborn like a football. That means no passing it or punting it.

Will #17

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I want crazy at my funeral. I want clowns, a petting zoo, fireworks, craps tables, male and female strippers, and a three-person band composed of old men wearing striped vests, black pants, and straw hats: one plays a banjo, another on tuba, and…

The Bird King's employees

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The Bird King's advisors and ministers are a range of rusty kitchen utensils. They all observe a respectful silence in his presence.——Contrary to popular belief, the Bird King is not an atheist. His meathook priests do their rounds at twilight.——The…

Monaco Memories

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Back then he raced, grinding gears and skimming the edges of death.

Early Decision

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Melinda said forget the kegger last night, what we’re about to do will help you figure out whether you want to apply here.

Saturday Morning

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Saturday morning, and I’m pushing the old truck a little, chasing retreating bands of cloud shadows along a winding hilltop road.

Not Everything's Supposed to Make You Think

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you are on a missing boat in the middle Of a fogged out notion of some sort. A no nonsense paddle could be made out Of something as intangible as an Incoming wave. This could also be a Floating thought up map, man. In…

Too Weak for the World

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There was a certain romanticism in it, the salty old man sidling up to me at a bar, rhapsodizing in a slurred stream of conscious about the state of the world, the country, the state of his own heart. He didn't have an eye patch nor beard, nor was he…

Paying for Dinner at a French Restaurant So You Will Love Me

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What does she have / that I don’t have / that I can’t buy / for myself?

Quitting

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—It’s difficult to say, he said. I have mood swings. Women don’t like that. They become upset.

Work of a Reader

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Then it gets worse—this reading of books—I go to the café and can only read a minimalist there, one crouton at a time.

The Glassblower

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His beloved are paper-thin when he blows into the free end. Green tint from copper.

A Bad Year

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It's been a bad year, People dying. Some too close to home, Some too far away. I cry down to you, In your casket, and think you might sit up. You were not sick You went in just a moment, Looking stunning and alive. Not…

What You Choose to Take

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You first hear about the wildfire on the old kitchen radio.

Homonyms Explicated

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right/rite: Your touch smooth as impulse/ Swaying my mind