A Song Stopped the Aa by Rob Cockerham

Em, my Scottish ex was very loving. She said I was her jo, the ae she was going to marry.

We grew apart when she began searching her qi, studying world religions et baking. She was learning about ba and ka from Egypt, Ki and Akkadian from Sumeria, blood and os from Haiti.

Myself, I’d rather visit wikipedia and read about Leonard da Vinci, or visit the zoo with an ipod, watching ai climb bo while I listened to Ryan Seacrest struggle to pronounce band names (“ar ef el em ay oh”) Ha! But I thought we were getting along well enough. I loved when Em would meditate while baking, chanting “om” while a za or pi was in the oven. Mm!

She ended it abruptly. “I am leaving”.

Saddened by the end of us, I examined my shortcomings. Did I need drivers ed? er, ab work?

I went to talk to my dad. He’s Vietnamese and full of keen advice. He didn’t look up from an op art nursery ad on television. The slogan was joined by a long ut on flute: “Lo! It’s Ag Mart!”

“Hi Pa.”

“Oi!”, he held up a finger.

“Uh…”

“Sh!” He was staring at the ad, probably figuring the cost of al shrubs in xu.

“Um…” I pointed at my heart with a look of wo. “Ow.”

“Aw!” He thought for a moment. “Ah! Is she bi?”

“Na.”

“She into es and em?”

“En. Oh. NO!”

“Hm…”

He began a story, “When the Mu Xi Nu fraternity was banned, I thought “Yo! I’ll go do something. I am going to toss in a chunk of aa through Dean Frank de Toledo’s window, then I’ll take an ax to his scale model of the Chicago el and that ridiculous ox from Bowling Green!”

“Ho!” I marveled.
Ay. But as I go, I hear singing. It was the song of a child, my ma’s oe a li up the hill practicing her scales, “fa fa fe, mi re la so, si si ti!”

“Eh?”

“So the song, it caught my attention and gave me time to settle my id a bit. The mo passed. I ne threw the aa.”
He paused.

“Love is like od. If you care for Em, or any un, ye should let it be. Even if ya have to be alone for awhile.”

“Thanks Pa.”

“Oy! Now I’ve gotta go pe. Ta!”