The tinkle of the shop bell, the kindly shop

The tinkle of the shop bell, the kindly shop keeper, the open barrels of meat, I remember the old gizzard store like it was yesterday.

was what I dreaded most of all: a gizzard gnome. As I went to the barrel to retrieve the last of the gizzards I grabbed the small club I usually used to bonk the creatures on the

head, but when I returned, the gizzard gnome had disappeared. Before I knew it, all my gizzards had disappeared and I could hear heavy breathing over my shoulder...

The gizzard gnomes beady little eyes were fixed on my pride & joy, my parakeet. He licked his greasy gizzard coated lips. as he entered the cage but Squawkers wasn't easy pickings.

My poor, poor parakeet- What will become of him.

He is the only one I will miss when i'm gone, but I will write to my Parakeet every week.

I'll paint the picture of foreign horizons, the taste of new dirts lining the rim of my nose, the callouses in my skin. I'll pray that my words carry my meaning, and to him alone I

can hear it calling at the edge of night. Hold on. Do you remember?

The memory was fleeting, then it was gone. But the feelings remained and he left, the odd sense of deja vu following him the rest of his life.