My Cardboard Balcony

Rainbow Scars by Belinda Roddie Trust me on this. My heart's skipping beats every time I take a step, like a vinyl stuck in limbo. I can't stay here, I can't play here, I can't drink a beer without a panic attack. They're coming from every corner, don't you get it? You may think I'm overreacting, but I know demons when I see 'em. They wear torn up jeans and patched vests, and they smoke two phallic cigarettes at a time. They hold the smoldering stumps in their mouths like walrus tusks. They smell like wilderness, but they ain't the grizzlies I'm looking for. Last I came here, a man I thought loved me threw me into the bed of his truck. I was hogtied. He said he liked my beard, then proceeded to lick every inch of me clean with a tongue glazed with acid. I still feel the burns. So next time you try to drag me to "the best spot in town," know that your little rugged gay utopia is my nightmare on the weekends, when

I opened the door to the cellar only to find my way blocked off by several stacks of canned goods. Well, not stacks - that wasn't a word that served the image enough. The mountains - nay, towers - of aluminum cylinders boasting everything from corn to spinach to black beans to dried oranges were like metal monoliths to some sort of crazed, survivalist zombie-fearing god.