1845 5 1
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I’ve never liked birds. There’s something smug about the way they look at us, we prisoners of gravity, something self-congratulatory in their songs. Maybe I’m just projecting my own feelings about being stuck on the ground, attributing attitudes t
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144912
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In his dreams, he swam in piles of pills. Sometimes the piles were infinite, other times the were contained, tonight the pills were intense shiny reds, chalky yellows, deep blues and matte purples and swirled around in a children's inflatable castle. Derek swam happily,…
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197713
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Saddam Hussein was a street-side seller of hot nuts near Faneuil Hall. He worked undercover there during the last Gulf War until just after it, as the US slagged the Iraqis. If only they'd known while they video-bombed his underground bunkers and chased his doubles that…
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1618100
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Somewhere there are fires burning in oil barrels, ragged homeless men warming torn-mittened hands―one day I'll be with them.
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129541
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You gather their faces in the palms of your hands and their purple eyes blink, blink, unseeing.
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601612
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Madeleines, which he hadn’t touched in twelve years, had a place in all this, were accessories in his daughter’s violation.
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108251
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For those of you who come quickly as darts in black atmosphere, a bittersweet half. I'd like to be forgiven, for these thoughts which racket my insides, a tennis ball of occupancy. This yielding of song: a sip: sorting my business through the shield. No way of bartering the…
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151241
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What about the goons? Those criminals thwarted and left for dead in every action movie for the past thirty years. I'm sure at least a dozen survived the slaughters. I'm sure at least one or two came out if it reformed. This one who quit working for Columbian drug smugglers…
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116322
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a name is what you are, and a name is a wall between. one day let me be earth, so you may be allowed to say you love me. for now i am separate. i'm afraid that's how i will die, and …
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226351
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I should have covered myself with leaves. I should have wandered farther from the path.
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132331
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It was cloudy, the way he liked it -- no baking in the sun. People passed occasionally. He sniffed at the joggers, “Health Nuts,” he dubbed them. He hadn’t exercised since his last high school gym class.
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129131
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123651
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It starts with a letter, down the back of the couch, ending, ‘love, always.' I read only the kisses aimed at me - a firing line running off the page. How long has that letter hidden there? It secreted itself in a corner of the house…
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235712
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I can't remember the last dog I spayed. It's possible that one of the techs gave her a dose of preansethetic in her cage before I came in, so that when I met her, she was already a little…
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161012
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Crea grew up above a pet store and now she dreams of cats. There are too many of them to name, a slinking mess of calico, tabby, tortoise-shell, black and white. There are more each night. They whisper to her, words made of hissing mewls. During the…
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71532
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why were ghosts in wry mirrors feeding on hope?
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134443
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118341
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Couldn't get that first beer past his nose. Fared no better with wine, gagging on red and white. Then someone fixed him screwdriver.
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116480
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She plucks two eggs from the carton, weighs and measures them with the cup of her palm, the curve of her fingers.
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88241
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5. To hate one's race is always overrated;We built fair cities where there were no huts.The Frankfurt School should all have been castrated,And strung up by a noose made of their guts.Marcuse, you have caused the death of Europe,With Gramsci, Adorno, Freud and all…
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127861
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The unpublished writer remembered the carnage that surrounded his Foxhole in France and decided he was done praying. All around lay the evidence that no one was listening. The drunken pastor stumbled away.
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170641
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This bumble-bee been following me around all day. Ever since I woke up, it's been with me. I just now smacked it to the ground and then it crawled on my bag and flew up to me again, zooming all around me; it's frightening me, a little. Bee…
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107922
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All the baby monsters are being born on stage.
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115431
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Esmée sat alone at a table on the terrace at Marina Jack’s in Sarasota. She had been there ten minutes and no waitress had approached her.
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54232
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He looked at a man in a straw hat on YouTube and thought “that could've been me, if I'd learned to play the guitar.” He savored the wistfulness of the moment. The pluperfect always made him sad. But the conditional was almost too much to bear. Octopi were a…
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147710
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Almost on cue, Xavier emerges and is in the vendor’s face. “X,” as he is known around here, is indoctrinating the obvious newbie on the merits of showing up earlier and the logistics of placeholders and markers.
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87222
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But then there were car windows
bashed out on both sides
Glass on the ground
like Kristallnacht
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119722
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Tonight is our last night to dream.
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117422
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As I fall to the ground I realize that in a few moments I will be experiencing a new kind of pain. The last pain. The last pain I will ever feel.
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73331
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I saw this woman on a date at Denny’s
Friday night
With her 8-year-old son
No ring, vacant stare
Still pretty
But wolfing down
A stack of pancakes,
Looking around the restaurant
Occasionally
At a party of kids
From some church
Wh
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