Butterfly Net’s Catch

Millie’s a poet.

“We must be careful about what we pretend to be.” Kurt Vonnegut

Soaking in black raspberry vanilla scented water, classical poetry in song repairs Millie’s parched spirit. Her what the hell is it all about thoughts swirl clockwise — she pokes her big toe in the stopper’s loop pulling upward letting small amounts of water escape. The bathtub’s plumbing makes a ravenous sucking sound. Millie hangs onto safety grab bars — not like Alice slipping down the hole. Oh my goodness, oh my soul, there goes Alice down the hole.

The telephone takes its own message in the background, spoiling Andrea Bocelli’s Dare to Live in precisely the instant he breaks Millie’s heart — the gentle touch you couldn’t find. “If your name is Millie Brown, press 1. If your name is not Millie Brown, press 2. This is an attempt to locate Millie Brown.” Millie Brown slipped down the hole a little after ten Wednesday evening smelling of raspberries and vanilla. Goodnight.

“Give me your pillow, give me your dreams!” Carlos Reyes

Millie irons a frayed sleeved Downy spun blouse, and pours her change jar onto the ironing board — enough for a brown wrapped cup of breakfast blend on the west end of Laneda.

There’s stupid Mike in his boxers getting the The Daily Astorian from the curb — jeez. Mike places his hand on his forehead fashioning a baseball cap. “You’re looking, aren’t you Millie Baby.”

Millie lives on a slight incline above the ocean — uphill. A few inches on the right side of a researched red line on a revised tsunami probability map. Her neighbor Mike, on the other hand, lives downhill. When it happens he’ll be fatally screwed, and in spite of his magnificent backstroke will swim out to sea. My neighbor lies over the ocean. My neighbor lies over the sea.

Millie has a feeling of being okay telecommuting to Portland — a little Bailey’s in her coffee. She clicks publish; the page loads — another sip.

“In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life: it goes on.” Robert Frost