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It became a time when song no longer soaredbut climbed, hand over hand up a taut rope. One cracked voice was all it took. Cathedrals bombed and gone, carcasses opened to the sun,their old hysterias leaking out as new wisteriatwined slowly round. When the war finally came, it surprised us all by how old-fashioned it was, with a clattering hail of gunfire, shells falling like ....
Breakfast did not taste normal, so I went to Gilcren, questioning.He cracked me on the face and said there were ants in the cereal, which was of course my fault. I had, years ago, dislearned, which made me always to blame for trouble of this kind. I have an idea how this will sound, but events do map a life. Smarting from Gilcren’s hand, I came again to the single fact: ....
To float on something she has never seen, my daughter will need her teeth, which she did not get from me. Her liver, yes. Her death also. Her breath, no. To float, she will not need to be lighter than air, just lighter than terror, whose volume increases with heat. She will not need her peach cheeks. The green of her eyes neither. Terror is a color -less field. I gave her the ....
When you finish burning, what’s left sends a black thread of smokethrough fresh ash like a handwaving the last of us away.You didn’t ask to return,if you did, God never answered,passing your request to some minor deity,some lesser bird of paradise.Nonetheless, you’re here,your body the shape of a milk snake,whale shark, dust devil something only appearing to be ....
The day I began turning blue, I had taken off from work and was striding briskly down Main Street when a man said to me, “Hey, baby.” He smelled like funnel cakes, and he spoke with authority. I had been taught not to talk to strangers, so I kept walking past the quiet storefronts, my neck prickling.“What’s your problem?” he demanded. “You can’t say ‘hey’ back? At least turn ....