I got lucky the next day. They called my name. It was a different doctor. I stripped down. He turned a hot white light on me and looked me over. I was sitting on the edge of the examina...

red-eyed and dizzy as I the bird came flying all the way from Egypt at 5 o’clock in the morning, and Maria almost stumbled on her s…

here I’ll be 55 in a week. what will I write about

I went to this place to see a movi… on tv Alexander the Great, and here come the armies ta ta ta

think of de vils in hell and stare at a beautiful vase of flowers as the woman in my bedroom

So I took the exam, passed it, took the physical, passed it, and there I was—a substitute mail carrier. It began easy. I was sent to West Avon Station and it was just like Christmas exc...

The phone rang the next morning. Lydia had gone back to her place. It was Bobby, the kid who lived in the next block and worked in the porno bookstore. “Mindy’s down here. She wants you...

Luckily I had auto insurance that paid for a rental car. I drove Katherine to the racetrack in it. We sat in the sundeck at Hollywood Park near the stretch turn. Katherine said she didn...

I’m not going to die easy; I’ve sat on your suicide beds in some of the worst holes in America,

Nothing matters but flopping on a mattress with cheap dreams and a beer as the leaves die and the horses d… and the landladies stare in the ha…

I took Tammie. We got there a little early and went to a bar across the street. We got a table. “Now don’t drink too much, Hank. You know how you slur your words and miss your lines whe...

old grey-haired waitresses in cafes at night have given it up, and as I walk down sidewalks of light and look into windows

That night I took Tammie to the harness races. We went upstairs to the second deck and sat down. I brought her a program and she stared at it a while. (At the harness races, past perfor...