My Cardboard Balcony

The Open Suitcase by Belinda Roddie breathing before dying is a daunting task when all you have is a pack of stationery two pens and a Christmas card from a runaway mother who kissed you too tenderly with salt the scrapbook you had when you were three feet high a pair of stained glass sneakers watercolor waistcoat and a watch that has never told time and yet somehow this leather doppelganger of your past exploits boasts of a brand new era of diner conversations stale coffee cups and a tin can oozing molasses on the beaten railroad tracks it's almost as if the shoe prints form a face as you zip up the body bag and close your mind to the smell

The curse on her face was not beauty, nor was it ugliness. It was the expression of utmost fear - the painted panic like flaking rouge on two fat cheeks - that would not waver. All day and night, she stared through the window with two bulging eyes and pale cheekbones, lips quivering below her beaked nose. She was constantly afraid, and the terror never, ever ceased.

The red balloon had Mother's face on it. The green one had Father's. A strange pair of etched portraits bloated with the effects of helium. I couldn't turn my eyes away. The entire town was being cursed like this. It had started with a carnival. Now the balloons were circling the space. All with the faces of my friends and family. Blankly staring. Threatening to burst.

by Belinda Roddie All at once, the woods were awake. The trees writhed and screamed a painful wake-up signal - a high-pitched yet guttural rumble among the foliage and the deep brown soil that smelled faintly of store bought perfume. The wind swarmed about the drooping branches and whispered instead of whistled, the language indecipherable in the cold air of the carnal morning. The birds, rather than singing, bristled the lobes of each ear with their vicious flapping of their wings, every feather slurping up mist and fog with a stroke and brush of the sky's blue veins. I rose slowly from the rags that served as my bed among the wilderness, my eyes dry and a sour flavor lingering behind my lips in the sticky folds of my gums and tonsils. The sounds of the area did not alarm me, nor did they faze me. I was used to the cacophony, having been traveling through here for a good dozen days now, never seeing the edge of the forest during all the time I had walked. Unclasping the cha...

We found shelter in the form of a lost cabin, broken down and splintered in the Sonoma rain. The vineyards surrounding the bare-boned acres of the property were withered and brown, some ends scorched as if by flame. It was clear that the troops had gone through here before, scouring for survivors. But after that, it was as if they had been happy with leaving the ghost behind.

With Valentine's Day come and gone, I've been thinking about how different my life is for many reasons. The first is that I'm out of college, looking for work despite being under the weather healthwise at the moment. The second is that I'm currently in a relationship. So even though my girlfriend and I were not physically next to each other for Valentine's Day this year, it was the first Valentine's Day I ever celebrated with a significant other. My girlfriend and I have been going out for nearly nine months. Most of it has been long distance. We started dating in May, only months after I had come out as a lesbian on - ta da! - Valentine's Day! I know, kind of disgustingly convenient, right? But the thing is, we fell in love very quickly and we were unsure about whether or not this would work. And to our delight, it's worked beautifully. While occasionally she and I become overwhelmed with our relationship, it's worth every minute. When I can see...

Golden (A Villanelle) by Belinda Roddie An old man smokes a cigarette and waits for a northbound bus heading toward the bay. His head's desired in forty-seven states. The dissipating smoke around his face is pleasant in the heated August day. The old man smokes his cigarette and waits. The stale ash is strangely nice to taste. The mist around him swells and turns to gray. His head's desired in forty-seven states. He sees the sun upon the Golden Gate, its bloated waters, cast in pallid shade. The old man smokes his cigarette and waits. He has forgotten all the crucial dates in life, including all the friends he's made. His head's desired in forty-seven states. The bus comes 'round, but somehow, it's too late. He disappears - the mystery remains. The hunters smoke cigars and lie in wait. They find his head in the last of fifty states. The work you see here has not been edited nor altered since December of 2009.