Stories tagged writing

Nylon Folds of Oldness

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She scratched her scalp vigorously and a clump of gray-red hair came away. Who would want her with bald spots on her head?

Family—A Triptych

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On a Christmas night, as the bright star shone above a broken manger in a far-off land, doctors and nurses fell to their knees, witnesses to the hand-sized bedsore on his back, flowering all-of-a-sudden into a glorious bright-yellow primrose.

Cut Neatly into Triangles

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In fits of humor he’d send postcards to friends around the country emblazoned with the script, “From the desk of the Bird Mahony,” which, in truth, was a scarred mahogany bar table with unsteady legs.

The Dusty Attic

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Frail lips created the shapes of vowels, the vestiges of make-up in the cracked grikes, her eyes as a baby’s; comprehending, yet not.

Toy Soldiers

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---Fuckin' gypsies, someone yelled down to us from a balcony. ---Go home to your mammies and study math!

Starting Out

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Above the trees at the top of the lane, the Dublin Mountains stretch out in their low granite might, Neolithic graves scattered here and there, and the corries and ribbon lakes carved by the last Ice Age glazed by a winter covering of frost and ice.

Spit & Shine

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The poem about the butterfly that sang arias reminds me of the desiccated shell of the snapping turtle behind the outhouse. Clapboard houses and rusted drainpipes litter the highway like scattered kindling. Song of the opossum, song of the mournful. Spit and shine the…

sabotage

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people keep trying to get me/ "out of the house"./ they see fun in me, and cool in me,/ and want to spend time with me,/ and i am flattered most sincerely./

On Galway Bay: August 1971.

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Smoke from McDonogh's timber yard rises cumulusly over the city. Off shore a curragh with three men bobs in the heavy swell. Clouds. Green water. The splash of oars echoes.

Another Soulless City

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By the fire in the hotel room she rubbed the soles of his feet with quartered lemons, balling her fist and running the knuckles from toes to heel and back again.

Disharmony Under the Eyes of the Saint

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She, for her own comfort, palmed several Xanax and allowed the pillowy distance between them to inoculate her from his barrage of criticism.

This Writer's Life—Imagined Outcomes

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That bottle of Oban your agent sent on publication of your novel is completely drained, the congratulatory note in silver Sharpie still readable on the glass.

Animals in the Crescent City

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I’m not a religious man by definition, but I said two Our Fathers while I was pissing.

a few of my favorite beacons of hope and tenderness

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life is a lucky thing, bountiful among the drugs and flowers

Beauty

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She worked the research desk. Like most ladies before computers and cell-phones she lead a quiet conservative life. She wore dresses, spent time with family and friends...Emma also had been stricken as a child