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Dinner At The St. Francis Inn

I grew up in the suburbs, and the only time I remember encountering a street person as a kid was when I was about twelve, on a trip to Boston with my father to see the Red Sox play.

Green-Eyed Dog

I am nineteen, a pale pimply suburbanite so thin my knees and elbows knife through my clothes. I have learned almost everything I know from television and Time magazine. I was once afraid of the world, worldophobic, but down here if you show your fear you will be eaten alive.

This Prison Where I Live

When the door has been slammed behind him for the first time, the prisoner stands in the middle of the cell and looks round. I fancy that everyone must behave in more or less the same way.

Manners

Licking your plate, listening to screams echoing up the stairwell, entertaining yourself​

Toward A Theory Of Oranges And Desire

Sunbeams

The most dangerous word in any human tongue is the word for brother. It’s inflammatory.

Tennessee Williams

Living Well

I used to think “Don’t cry over spilled milk” was a warning not to cry from the beating you got for spilling your milk. My father’s violence at the dinner table was breathtaking. He would grab the offender by the arm and yank her out of her seat.

Selected Stories

I was having sex with a man, and I became frightened. So I got out of bed and covered him with potato chips.

Feast And Famine

This girl is old enough to understand that she is dying. But she is not old enough to matter. This girl is probably already dead. A newspaper photograph of famine is like the light of stars extinguished many years ago.

Solitaire

He would look into the pits the SS left behind and see the grabbing hands and slippered feet, the bloodstained clothes and pale limbs, the wide and frightened eyes covered with a film of dirt.