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You’re mine, Dositheus. I can’t get away from them. A multitude inside. Legion invites them and they come. Sometimes I don’t even hear myself screaming because the screaming inside me is so loud. I cut myself to remember that I am me. I wail to remember that I have a voice too. You will never
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When Judas kissed Jesus Did he feel the cold creep of despair Or hear the ragged breath of the future Whispering all the reasons why His life would never be the same? Did Judas let the kiss carry All the lovingly tender feelings Even as it ripped away the life He and his friends had
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God bless the laity Whose livelihood is not tied to budgets and attendence Who notice when you’re missing And tell you “you are loved.” God bless the laity Who don’t sit in meetings and make decisions Who recognize that they don’t know everything And tell you “you are loved.” God bless the laity Who are
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They said it wasn’t a real bad stroke, but it must have been bad enough because Mrs. Mabry didn’t come down to the grocery store after that. But that didn’t mean I never saw her again. Now that I knew where she lived, me and Momma went to go check on her, just like we
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What hurts me is the same as what hurts you The feeling I’ve been used The shifting glance disguising truth. The words you say behind my back When pot calls kettle black. The names you use against me When you purposely offend me. Pretending all is well While we both stew in hell. What hurts
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I see you standing outside in the yard Where I sent you after I was tired Of your stories about me. And the people who love me. Sometimes I wonder what you are doing Standing there, waiting for me As if I wanted to sink back into your bleak embrace. No, I say to myself
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“And when he had stepped out of the boat, immediately a man with an unclean spirit met him. He lived among the tombs, and no one could restrain him any more, even with a chain, for he had often been restrained with shackles and chains, but the chains he wrenched apart, and the shackles he
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There are things we don’t say as part of our social contract “It hurts me when you don’t return my messages” “I don’t like how that made me feel” “I feel like you don’t respect me very much” Because not saying these things keeps the peace And allows everything to go on without having to
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I phoned Kathy Jo before I went to bed that night. We’d gotten that phone put in only about three years ago. Daddy always asked what we wanted it for, we could just talk to each other if we wanted to talk. But Momma had convinced him we needed it in case of emergencies, and
The Quick and the Dead
Short stories. Creative experiments. Ideas that might not pan out.
The Quick and the Dead 