1.
With brutal honesty.
2.
Flame broiled.
3.
Lightly battered with tapioca starch and drizzled with tartar sauce,
producing an effect on the tongue relatively similar in texture to wet cement.
4.
In the morning after.
5.
Rasping, untouched, sprinkled with liver powder or pâté paste, held in the
crook of an arm.
6.
Rived or hacked into pieces with a boning knife.
7.
Hardwired.
8.
Giving little or at least no noticeable ideas on how to fix whatever problems
may arise when removed peels are slipped on.
9.
Hardy and robust with a hint of “Can you not dig it?” and cinnamon specks.
10.
Jailed.
11.
Worried about the numbers on a digital watch ever turning from 59 to 00 again.
12.
In space.
13.
Caught between lines in a tire store.
14.
Serendipitously (with beans and franks).
15.
Presiding over a mass gathering of cowcatcher collectors who keep mistaking
buffer-and-chain coupling for love.
16.
Candied and split, with crabapple jelly and mayonnaise in the chasm.
17.
Soft boiled.
18.
Fleeing the scene.
19.
Aptly arresting.
20.
Holding nobody’s hand, self-reliant, taut as a cooked hot dog, screaming, “I
made bail! Jesus! I made it!”
21.
Cascading out of trouble with no recognizable features, just a blank smile and
a horrified stare, sung awake by putting-green thieves who swap troubles out
for unremembered dreams.
22.
Out to breakfast, but keenly aware of which way the wind doesn’t blow.
23.
Doing standup bits in an empty basement room.
24.
Scaling fire escapes, shouting, “I am not your boondoggle! I will be no man’s
peeled prize! Get! I said, get!”
25.
Sleeping on a bed of snail shells.
26.
Mushy and mashed with raw cookie dough, salted, dusted with garlic butter and
chives, peppered, and honeyed.
27.
Abrupt, uncompromising, and true of heart.
28.
Miraculously out of the butter’s chain of command, with shiny cutlery on the
side, not dancing while the preparer sings, “My girl, she’s my only hope / look
at her through my telescope / nothing she does is ladylike / a mile to her is
an easy hike / she’s got the best hair / at least this side of Delaware / she
spends her days staring at the ceiling fan / dreaming about being a librarian /
she doesn’t own a single pair of jeans / I don’t think she’s going back to
Queens.”
29.
Out of context but in style.
30.
Finally through with being hunky dory while reading The Count Of Monte Cristo out loud.
31.
Aged for 13 years in a vat of pickle juice, then hung with paperclips in a meat
locker for 17 weeks, then rolled in wax paper, frozen for 2 days, and finally
held accountable for all the things they should’ve said at times when it
would’ve mattered instead of being sheepish and small and docile.
32.
Roasted and chopped into squares, in a martini glass with pelican gizzard
stones.
33.
Lawless, a bit sour, and lined with pink sapphires.
34.
Green, stoned, testy and jealous, and flanked by ripe plantains.
35.
In arrears.
36.
Riveted, at peace, glorified and underdone.
37.
With a bad, unfixable haircut.
38.
In all likelihood better off than they’ve ever been before.
39.
Injected with synthetic testosterone.
40.
Yellow handed.
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