Receptionist
byYOU REALIZE THAT THERE IS NO NEED FOR CLOTHES. Not for you, or the other girls in Bundel House. No matter how hot or cold Delhi gets, there will never be…
Stories
Drift
byTHE LAST PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES IS ABOUT TO PERFORM. It will be a kind of happening in the style of the late twentieth century. Something physical yet conceptual,…
President Badass
byPRESIDENT MOFO LIVES DOWNTOWN—of course—in post-apocalyptic Manhattan. Which is actually sweet because it resembles the gritty, grimy New York of the 1970s. The apocalypse wasn’t from nuclear war. America, Asia,…
For Denis Johnson: Estranha Forma de Vida (Feel It Still)
bySomething is just too funny. I have no idea what it is, because I do not speak Portuguese, just working-class English and a piddling bit of pauvre Francaise. The laughter…
Ash Wednesday
byTHE WIND KICKED UP, BLOWING THROUGH THE CONCRETE CANYONS near St. Peter’s in downtown Manhattan. Hair fled unmoored, resembling Medusa halos, framing faces marked with the moist cruxes from Ash Wednesday…
Breakup with a Goddess
byHE TOLD ME TO CONNECT THE DOTTED LIGHTS of the highway into maps, shapes of beauty. Shapes of beauty to him. I did not, and let my toes compress the dirt…
Muskie Doll Maker
byLIFE IS THE SHIT IN PEE PEE TOWNSHIP, OHIO. I nudged one nostril shut with my knuckle and snorted a fourteen-inch festoon of fire ants melting into a pineapple popsicle….
Traps
byEVERY DAY ON THE MOUNTAIN I AWAKEN TO FISH OR FORAGE, and every day at 4pm my walkie-talkie crackles with Uncle Mack’s voice ordering us down to target practice. Afternoons, I…
Mystic Pizza II
byTHERE WAS SOMETHING AWFUL ABOUT HOW THE PHONE RANG. It spoiled the oven’s hum and the patience of gathering snow. The squeak of non-slip shoe on non-slip tile. There hadn’t been…
No Matter
byWEARING A HOUSECOAT STAINED WITH BRISKET AND BORSCHT, my grandmother stands in the doorway blocking the light. She spits three times, mutters pu pu pu, mumbles a prayer. When she’s finished,…