Pulp Poem of the Week

2009-12-06T18:27:00.000-08:00

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Noirboiled Notes

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2009-11-16T03:00:00.000-08:00

She had no business being

so damned smart and

so damned sexually attractive

at the same time.

One or the other was fine.

A man could understand that

and cope with it.

Brett Halliday

A Redhead for Mike Shayne

1964

2009-11-09T03:00:00.000-08:00

His eyes were dimming crescents,
straining upward into the starred

night sky,
as if trying to make out, to visualize,
some phantom face that no one else

could see.
And what is love anyway but the

unattainable,
the reaching out toward an illusion?

Cornell Woolrich

Rendezvous in Black
1948

2009-11-02T03:00:00.000-08:00

She knew how.

Marvin H. Albert

Devil in Dungarees

1960

2009-10-26T03:00:00.000-07:00

What the hell!

Two hundred bucks a week,

and all I'd have to do for it

was occasionally kill

somebody for him.

"When do I start?" I said.

Bruno Fischer

The Fast Buck

1952

2009-10-19T03:00:00.000-07:00

Dead men

are heavier

than broken hearts.

Raymond Chandler

The Big Sleep

1939

2009-10-12T03:00:00.000-07:00

Ostensibly a lawyer, he maintained

a luxurious Hollywood office.

He even kept office hours.

But he hadn't appeared

in a courtroom for years.

He didn't have to.

He knew where too many bodies,

male and female,

had spent their lost weekends.

His was a nasty business

but he never had trouble

with his conscience.

He had none.

Day Keene

Framed in Guilt

1949

2009-10-05T03:00:00.000-07:00

What was that line

about walking a mile

in another man's shoes?

Oh yeah:

By the time he figures out

you've screwed him over,

you're a mile away, and

you've got his shoes.

David J. Schow

Gun Work

2008

2009-09-28T03:00:00.000-07:00

I'm not afraid

of dying.

Dying is

the easy part.

Jon Bassoff

The Disassembled Man

2009

2009-09-21T03:00:00.000-07:00

He lay beneath a single white sheet

which still showed creases from the

shelves.

This sheet had not been slept with--

and neither had Halquist.

Gil Brewer

The Bitch

1958

2009-09-14T03:00:00.000-07:00

Bookmakers have

remarkably little faith

in the inherent

nobility of man.

Charles Williams

Nothing in Her Way

1953

2009-09-07T03:00:00.000-07:00

It sure is awful

to die in Arkansas

with this circus.

Jim Tully

Circus Parade

1927

2009-08-31T03:00:00.000-07:00

His books don't sound

like he had any fun

writing them.

But you see ads,

you can buy every book

Zane Grey wrote and

fill up a whole shelf.

For people who

don't know any better.

Elmore Leonard

Up in Honey's Room

2007

2009-08-24T03:00:00.000-07:00

It had been good.

He'd thought he loved her,

and she'd certainly acted

the part of loving him.

It was like getting cut

across the throat

when he found she was laying

not one guy, not even two--

but every beer-faced stud

in the county.

And then coming back to him

with her fine virginal face,

her just-for-you-honey body,

and her church-going, fine, clean

mind that manufactured

all the crazy promises

that had him standing

on his ear night and day.

And he never knew until

that time in a bar,

when a stranger began

bragging to him

about the quick piece

he'd knocked off

that afternoon

in a park

on the edge of town.

Gil Brewer

Little Tramp

1957

2009-08-17T03:00:00.000-07:00

I don't mind if you

forgot my name.

It's about as ordinary

as a name can be.

Even I feel like

forgetting it sometimes.

It's not that easy, though,

to forget your own name.

Haruki Murakami

After Dark

2004

(translated by Jay Rubin)

2009-08-10T03:00:00.000-07:00

Sometimes

words

are just

a nuisance.

John Farris

Baby Moll

1958

2009-08-03T03:00:00.000-07:00

Sometimes

it is good

for a man

to be drunk.

Dorothy B. Hughes

Ride the Pink Horse

1946

2009-07-27T03:00:00.000-07:00

She started a low

continuous moaning,

as though she had

just been branded.

James McKimmey

The Long Ride

1961

2009-07-20T03:00:00.000-07:00

Did you ever stop

to figure that

there's all kinds

of ways of dying,

but only one way

of being dead?

Jim Thompson

The Killer Inside Me

1952

2009-07-13T03:00:00.000-07:00

I had to see you,

honey,

or I'd go crazy.

Hurry.

Gil Brewer

The Brat

1957

2009-07-06T03:00:00.000-07:00

It was an ancient house,

built in the late nineties

and constantly repaired

and restored since then.

There was nothing

but the look of money

wastefully squandered here--

a smell of money

even in the flower beds

where roses smelled like

sweaty fifty-cent pieces

instead of roses, and

the jasmine had the scent of

a disinfectant used in banks.

Harry Whittington

Hell Can Wait

1960

2009-06-29T03:00:00.000-07:00

You can label almost anybody

by finding out what time

they go to work in the morning.

Robert Bloch

The Scarf

1947

2009-06-22T03:00:00.000-07:00

New York and Hollywood

is full of her, she is

everywhere you turn,

and when you have reached

the ripe age of thirty-six,

you have learned it is

useless to try to warn

her of the pitfalls.

Because nothing can daunt her--

nothing except time,

years of batting her pretty head

against too many disappointments,

and her firm white fanny

against too many mattresses.

Steve Fisher

No House Limit

1958

2009-06-15T03:00:00.000-07:00

I had seen

so many houses burned down,

so many cars wrecked,

so man corpses

with blue holes in their temples,

so many awful things

that people had pulled

to crook the wheel,

that that stuff didn't seem real

to me any more.

If you don't understand that,

go to Monte Carlo

or some other place

where there's a big casino,

sit at a table,

and watch the face of the man

that spins the little ivory ball.

After you've watched it a while,

ask yourself how much

he would care

if you went out and

plugged yourself in the head.

His eyes might drop

when he heard the shot,

but it wouldn't be from worry

whether you lived or died.

It would be to make sure

you didn't leave

a bet on the table,

that he would have to cash

for your estate.

James M. Cain

Double Indemnity

1936

2009-06-08T03:00:00.000-07:00

It don't take

much brains

to outsmart

a man who

trusts you.

Jim Thompson

Nothing More Than Murder

1949

2009-06-01T03:00:00.000-07:00

What can a man do

when a girl

grabs him like that?

A man has to be

polite.

W. R. Burnett

High Sierra

1940

2009-05-25T03:00:00.000-07:00

"Don't move," he said,

in a voice that was

forty percent gravel and

sixty percent inert materials.

Donald E. Westlake

Somebody Owes Me Money

1969

2009-05-18T03:00:00.000-07:00

There was now only

the process of taking away.

He wondered if

it was like that with everyone,

and he decided that

it must be.

And he wondered how

they felt,

and reasoned that

they must feel

about as he.

That was all

there was to life:

a gift that was slowly

taken away from you.

Jim Thompson

Heed the Thunder

1946

2009-05-11T03:00:00.000-07:00

He cursed us in a low,

steady, monotonous voice,

ripping his words

off back-alley fences,

off privy walls.

Robert Bloch

Spiderweb

1954

2009-05-04T03:00:00.000-07:00

The lights were coming on,

twinkling in Glendale,

flickering over Forest Lawn,

sparkling along San Fernando Road.

Los Angeles, that gaudy old

whore of a city was putting on

her jewels for a big night.

Robert Bloch

Shooting Star

1958

2009-04-27T03:00:00.000-07:00

His knuckles hurt,

but the rest of him felt good.

It was strange how much misery

a man could unload

with one hard punch.

Marvin H. Albert

The Chiselers

1953

2009-04-20T03:00:00.000-07:00

Everything goes to sleep

if you wait long enough.

Paul Tremblay

The Little Sleep

2009

2009-04-13T03:00:00.000-07:00

What did it matter

where you lay

once you were dead?

In a dirty sump

or in a marble tower

on top of a high hill?

You were dead,

you were sleeping

the big sleep,

you were not bothered

by things like that.

Raymond Chandler

The Big Sleep

1939

2009-04-06T03:00:00.000-07:00

"Cheapskate," said the cowboy.

Then he frowned, thinking.

"Of course, perhaps he intended

to let you keep it."

Michael Crichton

Zero Cool

1969

2009-03-30T03:00:00.000-07:00

It was a very short distance

from where I sat on the bed,

and he stood at the foot of it

with his face turned from me.

Seven bullets couldn't miss him.

Some of them didn't.

Bruno Fischer

Fools Walk In

1951

2009-03-23T03:00:00.000-07:00

Want me to squeeze

the blood out?

Or maybe I could stop

the bleeding?

Cauterize it with my

cigarette.

Kenzo Kitakata

The Cage

1983

(translated by Paul Warham)

2009-03-16T03:00:00.000-07:00

In the magician's land of make-

believe and illusion

what one doesn't see is always

there . . .

only one doesn't see it

until the conjurer is ready to

show it.

The silks are stuffed within the

hollow egg,

the flowers collapsed within the palm

of his hand,

the card concealed on the back of his

fingers.

But death is the greatest necromancer

of all;

in a moment of inattention,

he makes his sleight and palms a

life,

and one does not realize

that the breathing figure is gone.

Bill S. Ballinger

The Tooth and the Nail

1955

2009-03-09T03:00:00.000-07:00

The Good Humor man passed,

his wagon full of ice cream.

Maybe an ice cream

would taste good,

Joe mused.

Then again

maybe it wouldn't.

Go to hell,

Good Humor Man.

Lawrence Block

Pads Are for Passion

1961

2009-03-02T03:00:00.000-08:00

She went along the sidewalk in

the sun

looking like something the censors

had cut out of a sailor's dream.

Charles Williams

A Touch of Death

1954

2009-02-23T03:00:00.000-08:00

A one-dollar bill has

a humble and homely look.

A five-dollar bill has

a few meek pretensions.

A ten is vigorous and

forthright and honest,

like a scout leader.

A twenty, held to the ear

like a seashell

emits the far-off sound

of nightclub music.

A fifty wears the faint sneer

of the race track.

It has a portly look

needs a shave,

wears a yellow diamond

on the little finger.

And a hundred is

very haughty indeed.

John D. MacDonald

Soft Touch

1958

2009-02-16T03:00:00.001-08:00

Let's all

go kill

the scared

old man.

Will Cook

"Let's All Go Kill

the Scared Old Man"

1959

2009-02-09T03:00:00.000-08:00

The Lieutenant flipped a lever
on a desk transmitter.
"Send Spillane in here."

Cornell Woolrich
"Marihuana"
1941

2009-02-02T03:00:00.000-08:00

He had greased black hair

parted in the middle

and a wax mustache;

wasn't tall and wasn't short;

and looked more like

his mother's side of the family,

but he didn't want anyone

to forget his father.

I made a bet with myself that

his parents never made it legal.

Earl Norman

Kill Me in Tokyo

1958

2009-01-26T03:00:00.000-08:00

"I am sorry for all men,"

she said.

"But the others I am sorry for

and send away.

You I am sorry for

and I let you come.

That's how I know

I love you."

Eric Knight

You Play the Black

and the Red Comes Up

1938

2009-01-19T03:00:00.000-08:00

He told about all the women

what he had knowed,

and all the saloons he'd been in,

and some of it was a lie,

'cause if all those saloons

was as swell as he said they was

they'd of throwed him out.

James M. Cain

"Pastorale"

1928

2009-01-12T03:00:00.000-08:00

She may

be a

feminist,

my boy,

but she has

startling

lapses.

John Dickson Carr

The Three Coffins

1935

2009-01-05T03:00:00.000-08:00

The night was like purple ink.

And it was as though the bottle

that held the ink

had been smashed against the sky

by some insurgent celestial accountant.

For heaven was pitted with its tiny,

twinkling particles of broken glass.

And there seemed to be no one

there to sweep them up.

God's office was closed for the night.

Cornell Woolrich

Fright

1950

2008-12-29T03:00:00.000-08:00

He was disturbed,

still trembling, still vibrating

with the throes of the crisis,

but he was the master;

the animal was downed,

was cowed for this time,

at least.

But for all that, the brute

was there. Long dormant,

it was now at last alive,

awake. From now on he

would feel its presence continually;

would feel it tugging at its chain,

watching its opportunity.

Frank Norris
McTeague
1899

2008-12-22T03:00:00.000-08:00

It would be fun
to cut Katsu,
to see what it felt like
to kill with a knife.
He'd already shot
somebody today;
if he strangled Kyle afterward
it would be like hitting
the murder trifecta.

Ken Bruen & Jason Starr
Slide
2007

2008-12-15T03:00:00.000-08:00

She spoke broken, halting English,
but since I spoke Thai better
than she spoke my native tongue
we conversed in her language.
Though for the most part
we'd used body Thai,
which is something like body English
but more passionate.

William Knoles
Jade Brothel
1961

2008-12-08T03:00:00.000-08:00

I'm not hard to hire.

All you have to do is

offer me money.

Robert Terrall

Kill Now, Pay Later

1960

2008-12-01T03:00:00.000-08:00

I found it amazing

how many men,

when asked to supply

a photo of themselves

by a young woman

over the Internet,

responded by sending

a digital snapshot

of their penis.

Charles Ardai

Songs of Innocence

2007

2008-11-24T03:00:00.000-08:00

Roger knew well enough

what he wanted to do,

but he wasn't certain if

he would know just how

to go about it.

In the end

that didn't matter,

however,

because Grace did.

James McKimmey

The Perfect Victim

1958

2008-11-17T03:00:00.000-08:00

They said the leg was going

to be as good as ever,

but it wasn't.

You could see that by

the end of the first week

of practice.

I couldn't pivot and

swing fast enough to

go with the play even

when I saw it coming,

and they ran through me

like B-girls through

a sailor's bank-roll.

Charles Williams

"The Big Bite"

1956

2008-11-10T03:00:00.000-08:00

As he took his woman,

the fire was solely his own fire

and there was the sordid and dismal feeling,

and finally the downright horrible feeling,

of being alone in the bed.

David Goodis

Cassidy's Girl

1951

2008-11-03T03:00:00.000-08:00

The ghosts

of sad, cheap souls

live on

in sad, cheap furniture.

Ryu Murakami

In the Miso Soup

1997

(translated by Ralph McCarthy)

2008-10-27T03:00:00.000-07:00

She was as beautiful

as only a woman

made for dirt can be.

P. J. Wolfson

Bodies Are Dust

1931

2008-10-20T03:00:00.001-07:00

Money is no fun

to go to bed with.

Gardner F. Fox

Witness This Woman

1959

2008-10-13T03:00:00.000-07:00

She gave me a smile
I could feel
in my hip pocket.

Raymond Chandler
Farewell, My Lovely
1940

2008-10-06T03:00:00.000-07:00

Guards knew when the blue devils had

seized the inmates of these cages.

They couldn't eat.

And there were times, too, when

even the guards couldn't eat.

Theodore Dreiser

An American Tragedy

1925

2008-09-29T03:00:00.000-07:00

She pulled off her brassiere and

held it aloft. There were cheers,

and she turned from one side

to the other triumphantly.

Her breasts looked enormously

distorted in the moonlight,

their hard, clean crowns gleaming

and the shadows they cast hanging down

like ugly sinister forebodings

of the ruin age would bring

to their strength, their thrust.

David Karp

Hardman

1953

2008-09-22T03:00:00.000-07:00

If you want to know

the truth that much,

go out and commit

a crime yourself.

That's the only way

you'll ever know.

Asa Nonami

The Hunter

1996

(trans. by Juliet Winters Carpenter)

2008-09-15T03:00:00.001-07:00

I looked down at myself.

It was like seeing

a technicolor rainbow shining

on a bushel basket full

of mangled bread dough.

Gil Brewer

The Squeeze

1955

2008-09-08T03:00:00.001-07:00

He shook tooth powder into his mouth.

His grandmother could smell liquor

like a dry sourdough in the Klondike.

Patricia Highsmith

Strangers on a Train

1950

2008-09-01T03:00:00.001-07:00

She leaned forward again

so quickly that

four things bobbed--

two of them earrings.

Robert Bloch

The Will to Kill

1954

2008-08-25T03:00:00.002-07:00

He tried to hate them because

they were enjoying themselves.

He collected some hate,

aimed it, and tossed it,

then knew right away

it was just a boomerang.

There was no one to hate

but himself.

David Goodis

The Wounded and the Slain

1955

2008-08-18T03:00:00.000-07:00

Brandy, he thought.

Actually, it was

carbolic acid.

Thus Philibert Faroux,

of Noroy, Oise,

outlived his spree by

a mere two hours.

Félix Fénéon

Novels in Three Lines

1906

(translated by Luc Sante)

2008-08-11T03:00:00.000-07:00

I sat up at the counter and

pretended to look the menu over

but I was watching Stella.

I was never so glad

to see anybody in my life.

There was something about her

that got me. She wasn't

all over you. She had

that cool aloofness--

luscious figure, soft skin.

I watched her fill

two bowls of cereal.

Marty Holland

Fallen Angel

1945

2008-08-04T03:00:00.000-07:00

It was a woman's gun,

a little pearl-handled automatic,

not as big as his hand

as he let it rest in his lap,

but there's no difference between

being killed with one of them

and with a .45 unless

it's prestige you're after.

Charles Williams

Hell Hath No Fury

1953

2008-07-28T03:00:00.001-07:00

Morning sun stripes cell.

Five fingers feel my hard heart.

It hurts, hurts, like hell.

Charles Willeford

Miami Blues

1984

2008-07-21T03:00:00.000-07:00

Her hair was falling over

her shoulders in snaky

curls. Her eye was all black,

and her breasts weren't drawn

up and pointing at me,

but soft, and spread out

in two big pink splotches.

She looked like the great

grandmother of every

whore in the world.

The devil got his

money's worth that night.

James M. Cain

The Postman Always Rings Twice

1934

2008-07-14T03:00:00.000-07:00

Her voice faded off

into a sort of sad whisper,

like a mortician asking

for a down payment.

Raymond Chandler

The Little Sister

1949

2008-07-07T03:00:00.000-07:00

He recognized the picture.

It was a snapshot,

blown up. A picture of

Patricia that summer in Maine

when she had worn the Bikini

for the first and last time,

wearing it that once

out there on the rocks,

while they swam. She had

large breasts. She had been

unable to control them.

Gil Brewer

77 Rue Paradis

1954

2008-06-30T03:00:00.000-07:00

The guy was dead

as hell.

Mickey Spillane

Vengeance Is Mine

1950

2008-06-23T03:00:00.000-07:00

Take me in some place

where I can't see them.

In away from

the open sky.

Glaring--

a thousand eyes--

Cornell Woolrich

Night Has a Thousand Eyes

1945

2008-06-16T03:00:00.000-07:00

Dramatics, buddy?

No, sir. No dramatics.

God or Fate or

some mysterious force

can put the finger

on you or on me

for no good reason at all.

Martin M. Goldsmith

Detour

1939