My Cardboard Balcony

Discounted Candy by Belinda Roddie Discounted candy and roses are treats when Valentine's Day has at last ended; we buy more wine to savor as we eat, and leftovers easily digested. Come sit with me across from the TV, though we don't have to watch a single show. I'll do my best at stilted poetry while you stick to your funny videos playing on your cellphone. This weekend, we will travel northwest - mostly west - to towns we are familiar with, and we will dream in abstract shapes after the sun's sunk down into the ocean. But before we sleep, we'll indulge in our cheap, sugary sweets.

We danced, and the sun dipped its hat in homage to our choreography. We danced, and the trees bent into curtsies as we swayed beside them in the wind. We danced, and the grass caressed our shoes while we laid tracks down with our weight. We pretended that, when we danced, the earth stopped what it was doing and watched. But in truth, when we danced, it was dark, and cold, and now even the stranger creatures of the night were intrigued by the contortions of our bodies.