Fiction & Poetry

I’m just too glad that Delia and the kids weren’t at the house when that girl came by last night. She was just too much trouble and it was a flat-out pain-in-th…

Diary of Anne Schwarzkopf, Walmart Customer Service Associate June 17 — I’ve been working here a week and someone has eaten my lunch again. Gloria says that it’…

Marta Stephanopoulos gave a heaving sigh as she pressed the red-phone button on her cell. Unable to speak at the moment, her fingers flew to her temples where…

It’s early on a Tuesday afternoon and two friends are fighting over a soccer ball on an oversized pool table which uses other soccer balls as billiards. The for…

Okay. So I can see how my recent downfall might be seen as just another junky’s story, but here’s the thing: I’ve got it under control. I only use it to manage…

After work Clara would sometimes take the stairs down to the dock where the aged longshoremen would drink beers after loading or unloading whatever cargo they h…

...And what was so goddamn great about being twenty-three? Rage wracked and sad, left alone in a great big home Endlessly reading useless novels, smoking ch…

The mind of a poet is essentially suspect For it is full of the lies of its teachers. The fresh mind of a scientist must reject The naïve pontifications of…

He wants to write his own happy ending And I hate to break it to him, but he can’t. Lord knows I’ve fallen into that trap before. The story’s awful when y…

I wish that some Hollywood producers had the balls To make superhero movies with some chutzpah. Coming this summer, Clark Kent is gunning for a raise, But w…

To Paul Z. Stoddard Red Foo and Sky Blu died a long time ago; Replaced by your enduring love of Foucault. Embrace the pain, the drudgery of work, And forg…

What’s it like to be a cable news camera operator? To go to work everyday to catch accidental spittle On your lens and face from some human impersonator?…

Gated reverb finger snaps and sizzling high-hat sixteenth-notes Choral bass drum thump on the downbeat Punctuates the sawing organ swells Then recedes ov…

Toothy grin where have you gone? To the bottom of some anonymous hole Under splintering damp wood Below white flowery wreaths standing Among the early w…

...And other work-related short poetry Hours {#hours} Cold Coffee, gritty And oily with time, just like Myself as hours pass. Nobody Knows What They Want on…

Two ravens alight in Sunset Park, No shoulder to set upon, they talk: “Used to be so good,” said one. “But was it though?” said the other. “It is so easy…

Jesus, scoop my eyes out with melon-ballers. I can't stand this godawful world no more. Phone lines are full of collections callers And my inconstant girl…

To Tifani Tamayo Eerie. Does this mean that it's that time In life when there are more endings Than beginnings? That the rime Of age begins to weigh on th…

Big baller, shot caller, Oh\! That’s me, my dear friend. I’ve roped the dope Won’t drop the soap Yeah, I’m true to the end. And at the end of the day…

Paranoia. In the cracks and crevices of this Babel-like city. They’ve managed to fool everyone, But they haven’t fooled me. The tower’s falling A…

We needed an awful big house to hide ourselves from each other And that’s what we got in November of two-thousand-and-three. Even my father struggled to say…

There’s something fatal about Surf Wax America: That after the sun’s gone down for the Fall, Thus do our young lives come to their sad end. We suffer the…

Gimme a segment of that sweet potato, Slice me up a polygon of that pumpkin, Don't trouble me with degrees of donuts, Because three-point-one-four is Pi D…

Like the buffalo on the plain Startled into a run by rain Children on this particular day Are more ready to play. Their random movements Evocative of qu…

Once, my heart would not give way. It was a decadent sadness, A sweet hell in which to decay. Indulgent and cloying, nonetheless. And it couldn't be lust…

To W.C.W. God bless you Mr. Rosewater For all that you have done. While we pore through SQL, You’re absolved of your sins. Tabbing through endless Sprea…

Mangooooooooos Mangomangomangomango Frutas\! Mangooosfruta\! Mangomangomangomango The cool wind blows off of the deafening surf Of Santa Monica — where…

Standing in the rain, a cigarette freshly lit, My hand serving as an awning for its burning ember, Funnelling smoke up the sleeve of my windbreaker, I won…

To D. She smiled and four years fell away from her face. Laughter and tears and memories of mine and hers Vanished in a fraction of a second, sublimated to…

At the Lemongrass Cafe you can get a bowl of pho For just a little bit more than eight dollars, but there’s A rule about charging at least ten bucks on a ca…

In the wetlands of Las Vegas— To the East, below the mountains— Are innocent melodies And naïve fantasies. Among the tall grasses— Gently rustling, quie…