My Cardboard Balcony

Collaborative Poetic Effort by Belinda Roddie I've got a chandelier swinging from the ceiling of my mouth, kept in a little penthouse in my soul - got those metaphors from a student and fellow teacher. They came up with them to the sound of a ping pong ball. Chandelier's the only original image I could add to the architecture they set up in my brain - which I guess is a cerebral castle, with turrets where I keep my dreams, and with a dungeon for all the secrets I will forever keep from anyone else. But don't bring the tongue into the meter - that was enough to make that same student take a lap around the school to wash his mind of the complexity of the mirage.

Helplessly from behind my steering wheel, I watched the truck swerve into the left lane, smacking a nearby minivan and sending it careening into the barricade. What happened next was a blur to me. All I could do was keep driving, roaring past the accident as the offending vehicle finally spun to a stop and blocked off the freeway behind me. Were there children in that minivan? I would never know.