My Cardboard Balcony

Chewing Gristle by Belinda Roddie Battled Barry was chewing gristle off a hunchback bison's toe hoof, gill, while blowing bubbles through a cigarette that was open on both ends drooping sadly over a withered bouquet of white tulips drizzled with chocolate syrup from the back molars of Barry's gashed lips feverishly gnashing for a shred of meaty attention not the fat, fat, fat.

A crossfire medical examination made Lucy cross and Larry even crosser. The festering marks on the poor woman's hands never seemed to go away or lose their color. It was always red. Red, red, red. Very very red. Like a traffic light against the industry skyline of Los Angeles. Pastel red that grew warm sticky in polluted air. And always that tender stinging from the core of the wound to the very edges.