My Cardboard Balcony

Soulsplosion by Belinda Roddie Oh, God, it's everywhere - neon splatters on the walls - tattoos of past hopes on a chair leg's splintered flesh - rainbow skidmarks from fleeing the scene too fast - too fast - too fast - I am incapable of stopping the eruption of volcanic emotions from my opened chest - I am hopeless to stop it. Fucking. Hopeless. When will I stop breathing ash without ever touching a cigarette? When will the tears I cry stop scalding my skin as they steam along the sides of my nose? I am hot, I am cold, I can burn bridges and freeze hearts. I am a bunsen burner out of control. I am chemicals in a closed vial, waiting to eat through the glass in a vibrant, colorful geyser that leaves nothing but a mess and a miasma of spite in the laboratory. Seratonin and dopamine and love and promises with just a hint of something strong in my system. Take off that coat, doctor, it's not white anymore. Lock the doors behind you and leave me th

"You've grown confident," remarked Allison. "Too confident. There are some things you can do, sir, but they are not exactly well-defined or honed. You are an amateur at many things and an expert at none. It's all well and good to dabble, to inform yourself, on history, mathematics, the arts. But trivia doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things when the only skill you actually have is bragging about the little that you know."