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Tea Party

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The apple tree is pretty and hangs On it's limbsFull pictures Like the executioner songover the head of a bladeAt the end of a rainbow waiting for a cold cloud To blow away a daffodil And leave porcelain tea cups at the end of a dull dayLike doilies waiting to be ripped…

The Good Boy

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I blinked the darkness out of my eyes and saw the man again; I could smell his breath. Just like dad’s. I must have fallen asleep. My eyes felt so heavy. I was cold. Why was I cold?

Arcana Magi - c.29: Without a Fight

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Alysia lifted her head and felt Reya wipe her tears away. She looked at her friends and smiled a little. Happy that she was not alone.

Arcana Magi Behind the Scenes: The Making of Arcana Magi Universe Ver 2.0

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A Nonfiction Behind the Scenes look at how the Arcana Magi Universe came to existence.

Slide Steel

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Fat Patty sniffs the delicate waft of peat and sidles over, proffering a grope in exchange for a few wet-lipped swigs. Hell yes.

Suicide Draft

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So, dear world, whose dearness I have never truly known, I bid you adieu.

suggestive lipstick

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Maybe in some lie you told, your life began making sense. Not mine. But your quiet beauty may be what carries you. We have to both quit eating Couch Potato Chips, and read the book Tender Is the Squid, instead. Your ghosts – they’re so soft and sensitive.

Pink Slip For Mitt's Mutt

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(Recently unearthed from a “Lost Luggage” travel trunk abandoned in a train station in Salt Lake City, Utah) Dear Seamus: Boy, we sure did enjoy having you as a member of our family all those years. I would have to say you…

Jim

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Jim twisted the skinny trunk of his body in a fast, violent jerk just as the cop grabbed the buckle of his left Harley Davidson boot. When the boot flopped off, Jim found himself sitting upright, ready to jump up and run. But then he felt the baton lock down on his…

Quitting Is Easy

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I took up smoking just to show the world how easy it was to quit. It’s been five months now, and my wife is wondering why I haven’t yet.

Construction

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A tattered bird had a made a tomb in tepid water, it was a puddle near the framework of a half-built room— but the soul's a swerving tunnel and the dead are waiting at the end: all sorts of animals huddled at the fringe where littered pine needles stand and creep…

Upfaked Out of My Love Shoes

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A dirty-blonde woman in a little black dress, her face a picture of chagrin/ Was similarly looking around as if lost, other’s heads ending at her chin.

The Black Hole Cometh

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A few months back, Bob Delaney, the old Black Hole’s man with the plan (and more importantly, the check-signing authority), hired a young new guy named Gary — who had the unfortunate last name, Indiana — as a geriatric nurse at Bufordsville Retirement Com

The Water Tower

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Every other year or so, a high school senior would go and climb the thing, and paint something vapid, jejune, as the spinster English teacher would say.

Payton, Pelt & Hargrove: 3 (Sorta) Young Lions of the Jazz Trumpet

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It’s the middle-aged jazz musician who tends to get lost in the shuffle; no longer news, and not ready for the marble statue-treatment.

On A Highway Somewhere

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When I think about love, I actually think about life. And when I think about that, I wonder if we’re really who we used to be.

Star Dance

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It comes to him in the night. When he's lying there, staring at the ceiling. The shadows dance on the white paint, forming into monsters that get you when you sleep. The moon hangs low in the sky, dancing with the stars in a ballet that lost all movement

Ojibwe

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"Did I have a choice? Could I just open my eyes, did I have to ‘see’ as he was telling me now I could? I decided to go for it. What did I have to lose? This was all a dream, too much driving to get here, too much reunion, too much food, too much beer. Or

Falling

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She lets the book drop through her fingers to the floor and stares straight ahead watching the red lights streak by in the darkness. The train rocks her away from the seat and back; she rolls her spine along the plastic to absorb the motion, taking it away from…

Le Petit Clown - August 9, 2002

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Bald on top and wavy curls projecting from both sides. He looked at me and his eyes rolled round and round in opposite directions. He asked, "What did you think of the play, clown hater?"

Archaeological Treasures Yet to Come

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The museum’s catalog description changed much less than the painting over those years. He wasn’t curator-in-chief of catalog descriptions, however, that task went to a curator arriving by another door.

Celes' Most Important Question

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This was a word Celes had not ever heard before. "Ethics?" "Ethics is… Well, let me see how to put this." He put down his fork for a moment and thought before continuing. "Ethics is the study of the form of what is right and what is wrong."

Follow My Lead

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I ran down the list of reasons she might be calling. She could be bankrupt, having a mid-life crisis, or maybe had a terminal illness. Either way I was clueless, as I had absolutely no emotional bond with the woman I came out of.

Arcana Magi - c.26: Science versus Magic

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Brie stood before the dwarf that activated the de-paralyzer. She noticed her blueprints spread across the table beside the computer the dwarf stood in front of it.

Batteries For Smoke Detectors

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Crack open the roof-- raise the battery on a platform with chains up into the lightning

My Hero

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Anyway, without Mr. Little, my life would have been much more difficult after my father was arrested. It was difficult enough as it was. Mr. Little was my personal hero at a time in my life when I had very few people that I could look up to. The funny

Five Million Yen: Chapter 34

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Al-Sidran pulled out a switchblade knife from his pocket and proceeded to carefully cut open the box. Ben could tell it was razor sharp by the way it cut through the packing tape and cardboard.

Sunset

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Behind the bellicose façade lay a soft, compassionate soul. He sat within a swirl of rosy twilight hues, buoyed by the gently creeping tide. A dark wall approached and he mechanically spun and began stroking into the glassy canvas of light and ocean that lay between him…

True Story, Every Word

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So, I see this is story one-upmanship now. You think you’ve got stories! Here’s one for the books. Here goes! In 1968 I had a day job as a payroll clerk at the Kroger Company, but, to maintain my glamorous lifestyle and my impressive efficiency ap

The Persistence of Loss

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"I packed up the rest of his things today. Irony is the fact I'm still picking up after him, despite the fact he's been gone for two weeks."