All Those Crazies

By Laura Stamps

Daffodils. That’s what she wants today. Something light. Cheerful. Nothing dark. No. Not today. She looks through the box. Her collection of postcards. Finds it. A daffodil. That’s the postcard. Yeah. That’s the one. “Dear Elaine,” she writes. “This book I ordered. You know. From Amazon. It came today. Picked it up at the post office. Just now. An exorcist. And the demonic. That’s what it’s about. Had to order it. Had to. So, so curious. I am. I mean. If you knew my past. My love relationships. Disastrous. Truly. Those bad-news men. Boyfriends. Husband. Crazy, crazy. All of them. Geez. If you knew. You’d understand. But here’s the thing. Why me? I’m like a daffodil. Light. Cheerful. And yet, and yet. These crazy men. Demonic. They are. They act like I’m a magnet. Just for them. Insane. That’s what it is. And it needs to stop. Their attraction. To me. Stop. Please. I don’t want them. Don’t like them. Bad-news men. I don’t. Maybe this book can help. Maybe, maybe. Who knows? But this I do know. The crazies. Those men. Bad news. They’re out there. They are. I mean. A girl can’t be too careful these days. You know?” 

Laura Stamps loves to play with words in her fiction and prose poetry. Author of 49 novels, novellas, short story collections, and poetry books. Forthcoming: “The Good Dog” (Prolific Pulse Press 2023) and “Addicted to Dog Magazines” (Impspired, 2023). Winner of the Muses Prize. Recipient of a Pulitzer Prize nomination and 7 Pushcart Prize nominations.