My Cardboard Balcony

Okay. So I love spoken word. Have for a long time. I've dabbled in writing poetry that's meant to be performed quite a bit. And today was the first day my high school students began performing their own poetry and speeches in front of their classes. It was also one of the first time I really performed my own poetry, too. See, I've done poetry readings before. Back in 2012 and 2013, I made somewhat regular appearances at a local poetry event in my hometown. I was actually called a modern day Dorothy Parker - which is, in fact, a huge compliment. After I moved to San Rafael and started going for my teaching credential, however, I didn't exactly have time to stand in front of a microphone. I hadn't tried memorizing pieces in years. I ultimately settled on more conventional poetry as I delved further and further into my work. And I get that. But one of my New Year's resolutions this year was to go back to performance in some way. So today was the first step in...

Aortic Eruption by Belinda Roddie Is this how it feels to have your heart explode?

You know...I really do miss consistent OneWords. No update on the website again. Le sigh.

The Two Of Us by Belinda Roddie The two of us were sitting on the dock when the moon swallowed up the sky and stars. You wore both a green and a purple sock, and you couldn't stop talking about cars and motorcycles. I was far away, absorbed in the glow of Diana's eyes, her bow taut and her arrow bright as day, quiv'ring like a bird does before it flies. I knew it wasn't practical to stare upon an orb thousands of miles away - no, hundreds of thousands - and yet, the hair stood up across my head. You didn't say a word about it, or seem to notice. You chatted idly in your endless bliss.

Shawn went to the grocery store to pick up some beef jerky and some lighters. She wouldn’t tell the cashier why she was buying the lighters, but she wasn’t a smoker; one look at her white, pristine teeth could tell you that. When she got home, she wrapped up the stray fingers in the plastic bag and buried it in a tree trunk. And then she used the lighters to set the tree on fire. And she watched the inferno while eating her pepperoni-flavored beef jerky.

Letter To My Ex-Boyfriend by Belinda Roddie There was never a better time for us to separate: I think before self-driving cars existed, I was watching our relationship barrel toward a cliff without a driver. Or if there had actually been someone in the driver's seat, then they were probably asleep at the wheel, dreaming about flying and then plunging into a pit hotter than Death Valley during a September heat wave. I think you loved me, or at least what you hoped I could be for you. You drew my potential out in chalk and wrote it on glass pipes. We shared smoke signals and carved private messages out of our mouths. The swollen veins in your eyes never went away, though I think they stopped pulsing so much. It was like I was watching wires about to burst from a power surge, and I really didn't want you to short circuit on our way to the bowling alley. I never got much better at that sport. I have my own pool cue now: It's black and red, smooth, like ...

I thought maybe the way we moved toward each other was just a fluke of physics - that the elements around us simply pushed us closer together as if gravity was pulling from the space between us. But your body was warm - really warm. And I felt my hands tremble as you gripped my wrists. And we ignored the movie in front of us, and the people around us chewing loudly on popcorn kernels.