My Cardboard Balcony

Degrees Of Separation by Belinda Roddie This heat is petulant, personal: Handcrafted, needle and thread settling steam into yarned and yawning bones. Not even in my own home can I avoid the veil, which seals the sweating in, rather than whistling it out with a funeral tune. As I walk alone on the curb that locks teeth with Fifth and Thirteenth Square, I'm reminded of when my mother melted in front of me, as the sun revealed its full head of hair. She revealed my new reflection in her puddled face, and that was when I learned my eyes swallowed stars. Not the hottest ones, but the ones that were already dead, since the dying scream loudest, burn brightest, laugh hardest, and tell the absolute worst jokes. This month, I'll break my jaw on cinder blocks, holding up the scorched carcass of my father's Jaguar: defanged long ago, worthless in this swell of disenchanted summer night. Next time the heat waves at me, I'll spit directly in its eye, then

And in the red corner, we have the Devourer of All Souls. He sits with his tails all fluttering across his stool, drinking a Cosmo and stirring his cold soup with an ivory spoon. He recently got on testosterone, so he's feeling good in his transition. Soup could use an extra soul, though. And salt. In the blue corner, the opponent smokes a cigarette and rethinks his challenge.