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He'd hung above her head for months.

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I almost kept him on the shelf with all the trophies.

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Go ahead, boy, pout like a fool.

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He stays a couple of yards behind me as we slog uphill. I try to diffuse the tension with a coy toss of head, slip on wet leaves. My ankle rolls and I splat noisily down. From my new angle his beard looks less stylish—bristles straggle all up his neck. He maintains…

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We met in the theater.

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I am a purveyor of leeches. All my friends are purveyors of leeches. We meet weekly to compare our wares.

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No snippet to see, here. The piece is so short a snippet would be the whole thing.

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Hi, I'm Harmony Korine. I esteem douchebags.

Bad Heart

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You died from a bad heart.

To Be Young and In Love

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We were in her boyfriend’s room in the middle of the night. I was seated on the bed, and she was on the carpet poking holes in his condoms. We were doing it in the dark, to prepare for any contingency. The room smelled like old laundry and body spray.

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“I’ve been standing across the street for fifteen minutes. I was walking by and saw you weren’t moving. So I watched—you didn’t move at all.”

When Alone

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She'd sit out on the back deck and dig into the skin around her toenails with a paring knife until it bled. He'd listen to a single aria of Opera's Greatest Hits, number 10, until the cusp of some feeling, either despair or rage, would build and fade. Then he'd start…

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We wonder if this is how we tangled in our mother's womb: hands to feet to heart.

Fatuous Dialogue #1

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—Was it true, what you wrote in that poem? —Pretty true. —What do you mean “pretty true”? Was it true or wasn’t it? —It was as close as you get to truth in poems.

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Night fell and the photographer slept, one hand between Prue's legs.

Requiem for a Glass Heart

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The stone thrower lives in a glass house with his glass family. His neighbors often stop in front of his home and stare at the flesh and blood man as he goes about the business of living with his glass wife and glass child, their glass furniture and glass lives.Every…

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A tiny story, 55 words, just enough to fit on a . . .

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It isn't for you to know

The Painter, the Actor, the Piano Player

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1.As fast as that I wake to astonishing desire. I'd met you at my parents' house just the weekend before but for them (them the drained students trying to relax, refill before their afternoon sessions) you are the stranger in the room,…

The Evening News

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When I got home from work I parked my briefcase in the hall, acknowledged our dog and immediately went into the kitchen where wife, Sherry, was cooking supper. Without turning around at the sink, she said her usual, How was your day? I said, Fine, and yours? She turned…

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I asked the hospice nurse about maggots.

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For some, a vertical pattern will evoke prison bars, for others, product bar codes.

Animals in Reverse

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She was still alive when I started to write the story of her life, called Lucy's Story, about her recovery from catnip, but it was not the real story. In the fake story, she took the subway to A.A.

Yeah Yeah I Will I Promise

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After we have sex I slip cash into your purse, just a few bucks, without you knowing. You're not a whore, but I'd like to buy you lunch sometime without having to be there.

Waste

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When the compost thaws the past oozes out into the present....

Prompts

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Write a poem in which your father is a dog and you are his leash.

Accounting

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It shouldn’t take that long to count/ to six but when the six are cats, arithmetic/ assumes Heisenbergian properties/ as the objects counted defy the count.

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what if I die?

Napomo 17: April 7-12

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The drinking will continue/ until morale improves