My Cardboard Balcony

Tempura Sushi by Belinda Roddie Curious how the battered fingers rise from seaweed - a rolled up ocean, wrapped around a shriveled hand. The heat subsides, but the taste lingers in the back of your throat: the ample curves of the Pacific, jet streams drawing catches into steaming nets. Apart from the flavor, the ambience of the restaurant, as you devour the fried palm of God, is simply sublime.

Watch how, on the island, everything is green. See how the wind makes all of the palm trees sway. They want us to call this utopia, but the taste of scant fresh water and undercooked fish is not something I've adjusted to in all the time we've been here. The chief is fat with white hair, and she directs us all to wade up to our knees in the waves of the ocean. She makes us pray that a god I don't believe in will save us.