The Echo in the Soil
The handwritten letter I found this morning on top of the standing cabinet in my bathroom was written on a paper napkin that wasn't from inside the house. I sat down, and began to read:

Dear Heather,
There is no hiding it, I am gone. Having served (and loved) my due and fitting time, I've now met my passage for departure...

Distinctly Alberto's writting. Last night, I'd left to bed a bit before midnight. He hadn't seemed melancholy at all. Didn't appear wrecked up- but clear, calm, engaged in the conversation and the cool too-sweet Chardonay. (note to self:Chardonay's suck...never again). What kind of mess begins this day? Poor Dearhearttorturedpoet. God, if he did it in the living room, that's going to be a mess. Yes my heart raced a bit (are you satisfied much then?).

The young man who expidited my transcendance (as it was, my exit, a dance) was an unwilling actor in my final act and after an errant hair. In honesty he knew not whether it belonged to you or him- but in reaching for it he found (as I called) me. The hair now joins the small "good bye" left of me for you.

I look back up at the cabinet, and pulled up my pannies. My lovely blue glass perfume bottle- sits- without a neck. It's crystal head, rests in it's belly- sad, and very dead indeed.

(The hair itself is proud, vain and should likewise be ferried off acknowledgments stage)

Christ, I'm thinking, if my new houseguest continues chasing hairs as if a bull, my little apartment may be reduced to splinters by week's end. I recall a poem dedicated to the man going something like: 'hair hair everywhere on floor and in my chair- it's even in my underwear'

Heather, I shall return to you as all things return, eventually in different shape if still same function. (--->) What's left of me is a promise to return, and when I have, it too may be retired.

The observant (if obsessive) young man will find himself an unwitting agent in my returning you
...provided he can still walk following your reading of my farewell.

Yours,
here-beyond and upon reunion,
lovely blue bottle.

First Katherine and now this. Poof.
All my pretty ones dead.
Even the softest of boys break stuff.
No wonder old ladies buy and cover all things in plastic.
There comes a time, when enough is enough.
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Collecting plastic things and cats. I'm well on my way.