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Ways To Show Affection

The heat isn’t working in the clinic waiting room. A bronze bust of Margaret Sanger, patron saint of birth control, scrutinizes me from a plaster podium, and a slide show, Ways to Show Affection without Intercourse, is projected half on a pull-down screen and half on the cottage-cheese ceiling.

Essay #3: Leda And The Swan

Although the swan is not a delicate creature like a butterfly, and is not cuddly and cute like a kitten, it is a living thing that can feel pain and hunger just like any other living creature. In “Leda and the Swan,” by William Butler Yeats, a perverted sort of swan ends up performing sexual intercourse with a loose girl named Leda.

The Boy With Blue Hair

“He lives in San Francisco now,” she interrupted me, understanding immediately the apprehension in my voice. “I’ll give you his number,” she added, her words slow and steady and intentional, as if we were speaking in code.

And we were. She wasn’t just telling me where her son lived these days. She was telling me that he wasn’t dead.

Playing With Fire

Sexual fantasies, Kristallnacht, chemists

Sunbeams

I was half in love with her by the time we sat down. That’s the thing about girls. Every time they do something pretty, even if they’re not much to look at, or even if they’re sort of stupid, you fall half in love with them, and then you never know where the hell you are.

J.D. Salinger

The Woman With Hair

The first time we met, she didn’t say much but instead let her hair do the talking. Her hair had a lot on its mind. It went nearly down to her knees. This was in July, at a Hollywood Hills party thrown by the friend of a friend.

My Pink Tombstone

In spring of 1988 I became the caretaker of a twenty-acre plot my sister and her husband had bought as a prospective retirement location in the Black Forest of Colorado: elevation 8,200 feet. It was a great opportunity for me to write and reflect and rest up from the roaring hellfire on earth.

Taking A Stand

Facing a flock of cowards wearing sheets, caring for a parent, making a new friend