My Cardboard Balcony

Thirteen Hundred Riesling by Belinda Roddie The staunch, fit benefactor prized open a bottle with gold teeth and silver spit, licking the grapevine above his mortar head. No glass for him. He wished to serve the jewel mines of his family. Fortune wrought with spinning wheels. Fragmented heart to hearts with supposed fancy titles. Disinfected within an oaken barrel. "Will you drink for me?" he asked. Not drink with him - for him. Ever the charismatic beggar. Cardboard cut-out of extremities. The sweetness is somewhat palpable. A smile cracks in two above a glass stem. The cinnamon is spread. The ice is served in buckets. The meal is dry and uncouth. But at least the wine is good.

He was going to write a musical about a magical goat who became friends with a unicorn. Only the unicorn was the head of a Unicorn Mafia, hellbent on getting the McDragons to pay their dues. The McDragons owned a little pub in Little Ireland in an unnamed city, and there the ale would be spicy hot - you know, because they were dragons. I listened to him make his pitch and could only nod.