Butterflies the size of dinner plates flapping slowly past, towing the electric clouds behind them.
WHAT ARE THEY?
©Mae Ondracek, 6/17/2005
My
gosh, what are
they? They look like butterflies but
they are as big as our dinner plates. I
look out the window again and now I see them towing the clouds and I can’t
believe it, they are electric. The
little sizzle of the electric clouds is unbelievable. I never thought I’d see the day when clouds
were electric.
I went outside and
was careful not to bump into the butterflies.
I couldn’t believe how big they were.
I held up my two hands and couldn’t even cover one of them. And those electric clouds, how can they be
ever so big and noisy? They sound like a
buzz saw ripping into
something.
I stand there and watch what is going
on. One of the butterflies towing an
electric cloud, stops next door and the cloud rains
down on the lawn. I can’t believe it;
his lawn is getting rained on. Whatever
brought this about, I wonder. Then
suddenly it starts raining on me. I duck
back into the house just as a deluge comes down, just for a few minutes. Then to the other side of me, his lawn gets
soaked, too. Then on and on it goes,
wetting everyone’s lawn. But now I
notice the clouds are sort of looking kind of empty and forlorn. The butterflies take them high in the sky and
let them go. Then they come back down
and hook up to another electric cloud.
They keep doing this far into the night, until everyone’s lawns are
watered.
Well, I don’t mind,
except I didn’t pay anything for this service.
Can’t they just perform their duties and not expect pay? Maybe we are supposed to put out some sort of
food for them to eat. I look at the
neighbors but no one has put anything out.
I turn around to go into the front room, when there is a light knocking
on the door. I open it and a butterfly
hands me a bill. I can’t believe it, a
bill. I look at it and can’t understand
what the message says.
I can’t understand
what the message says, so I say, “Butterfly, how am I going to pay this?” He looks at me, shakes his head and flies
away. Now, I am more convinced that I
cannot pay for this service, when another butterfly comes by. He drops a bag and waits for me to put
something in it. I say I’m sorry but I
do not know what they want and he breaks my window. Now, I ask you, is that fair?
I shut the door
and hurry inside to put something over the window. Then I hear another window break and I run to
cover that one. They break all five
windows in my house. Before covering the
last window, I look out and see them breaking windows
in all the houses. What can be wrong
with these butterflies? They don’t
really think we can understand their marks, do they?
I keep hearing
windows smash and wonder if it will ever end.
I look at the clock and see it is only
Well, thank
goodness our telephone lines are all underground. I run to the phone and dial my neighbor but
all I get is a blubbering noise. The
butterflies have infiltrated our telephones, too.
Suddenly I hear a big flapping noise and sit up in bed. My window isn’t broken. Wow! I run out to the kitchen; the windows are still in one piece and I can see the neighbors. Their houses all look good to me. But what was that big noise I heard? I open the door and see it is raining. We haven’t had any rain for over a month and we sure need it. I stand there enjoying the rain and soon everyone is outside, marveling at the rain storm we are getting. We are so thankful for the rain, that we all clap our hands and dance around. We wave to everyone and head back home, happy to see the rain.