Scribd Stories

My gas-stained hands touch her steel, and for a moment all the world seems unemployed. (I stand in a hole reamed out by greedy oresmen, and silently wait for their own untimely closings.)

Just clang on the lamp if you need anything, mom. I'll just be lying here, thinking about how small morphine is, And how large life is going to get in six months to a year.

and with each passing day he shoulders the weight, as if he were the only strongman left in his own heart's circus-

These are the warning signs of a visceral God at work: The repressed hands become tender and forgiving once again, The calloused eyes begin to see the wonder of a thousand newborn suns, The chained heart learns to leap at the thought of angels and popsicles.

Leaving Iowa behind simply cleared the mind of many a pop idol; Farmers' sons and factories' daughters loved to twist and bellow, flaming out to immoral race records and jungle beats, backlashing furiously in their mudstained carnival velvet.

I picked up my first stray when I was five, and it promptly died. He was a fine catch, as strays go - Strong in spirit, eminently playful, relatively grateful; But he soon discovered the highway the hard way, And I discovered that traffic does not slow down for grieving boys.

I see in her mottled skin such visions of dishwater pain, The desperately overturned second-hand furniture, stripped bare of our lunch money.

Five disabled dollars later, this man is cleansed- Briefly allowed to borrow some human sunlight On another stranger’s bench.

Your tattooed stigmata is showing, my dear- that spot of willful blood lies dormant; while greedy hosts of Angels draw illicit lots, and seek redemption in performance.

Somewhere in the white hot core of the Dancer's spirit lie the remnants of too much vision, lies the residue of a thousand broken treaties: lies the child who bartered with discount Angels. She will no longer mistake the gardeners for her Messiahs.

Four small whispers can now leave rehearsal, the last cigarette has been ground to ashes. It was once important for us to kill some Negroes, no matter how many times they claimed to fear God― no matter how pretty their dime store dresses were― no matter how late they were for choir practice.

On the one hand, we have this couple-so young, so connected, so grounded. The balloon they released together into the Memphis air held two cards in tow as it found its way between their hands and the balloon maker's place.

#1 Darkness, and what stays Falls too close to the heart-Poor enough for beggars.

I sit beside the Cuyahoga creek and wonder how he done it- Pursued by motivated Native Americans across the burning Midwestern grass, until he found himself caught between the Devil and the wide blue stream.

Looking north up South Water street, the dying stand solid as parking meters, finding finer spirits underground than the ones they were promised.

we tried to stay away from anything plum, which looks so garish in the cold fog of authority, as the neighbors report nothing new between those two.

Do not whisper near them, sweet children, for war is loud. Men who served with General Anzio Find time for the occasional Bingo And find that corn on the cob can be quite the challenge.

The five older ladies have poured their tea again, And look to each other for recognition. This has been quite a summer, yes it has, And Charles and William and my boy Walter Have really taken a shine to their new garden, Says one, steadying her cup for emphasis.

Just expressing my mind.