If Only Just To Be Forever Free

                                                    
                                                              by H.L. Dowless

        There once was a little pearly girly with a pretty pearly grin. She swished so sleekly sweet when she walked that many swore that.., why.., surly she could never sin! But one warm day when the wind puffed enough to make a great snake spin a sightly spin, that little girl decided to just up and disappear for quite a long while, only to return again with just her darling little pearly grin.
        “Well now, dear Allison, shame on you,” cried all of the townspeople throughout the little village town! “Oh do tell us all now, just where is it that the likes of you have been? We are so sure that you have been a acting like an ole crazy doped up clown throughout our happy little town again... Oh dear, oh how this is just such a terrible messed up sin!”
        “Well now, oh my dear ones,” replied little Allison, “I've been around the whole wide world and back again! I hoped a great big blue bird and dared to fly with all of the angels on high. I sat down for soup with ole King Cole, which is worth far more to me than anything that money can buy. Why..., I even danced until I got all grimy and dirty, with a little ole elf playing the hirdy girdy!
         Oh yes..., and I shall never tell a lie, well I have traveled to beautiful Spain and played inside all of her massive mountainside crystal castles, I can't complain! Well now.., for gracious sake..., I've even ridden inside her enchanted choo choo trains! Well..., if I am not standing  here telling all of you the honest, blessed truth, then right now I shall snag my front tooth and probably just go insane!
          Yes! I even sailed a sail across that deep blue sea, only to come back here again...and with absolutely no welcoming cheers...., to this boring little town called Stenzilland,” screamed Allison in streaming tears!
          “Oh...my dear,” gasped all of the townspeople as they grasped their searing ears! “Me oh my,” how they did cry! “Now just please tell us why, oh why that it is always you who expects us to believe in these crazy messed up lies? What is it that is wrong with the likes of you? Can you not ever simply just tell us all the truth? Do you really think that we are simply just so dumb because we have all lost our youth? Oh please now, just tell us the honest truth!”
           “Oh no, no, no,” cried little Allison, that so gorgeous little girl with the pretty pearly grin! “How it is that I can never tell a lie... See? I have been around the whole wide world and back again! For me to tell anything else would be such a terrible messed up sin. I say, that it is all true, it is true! I shall yell out the words until my face turns all blue! How else may I explain this honest fact to the likes of you?”
          “Well then, just go into your room over there inside the old stick house. Now you can just take this straw broom and get to work....and just shut up your deceiving little mouth ….and be ever as quiet as a scampering mouse. Just get to work now.., and work until your skin turns all blue. Yes, that is just what you can do...so here!”
           ...and the townspeople handed her the straw broom....
           So they bound her in chains, dragging her mercilessly toward that old stick house, locking her up tightly inside that cold dark musty room. She continued to smile, even though they tried to kill her precious little heart with gloom, by locking her up so tightly inside that smelly old room..., with only a single silly mouse and a yellow straw broom.
           Poor little Allison just cried, and she cried, as those townspeople so cruelly shoved her aside upon that disgustingly filthy floor. That heavy wooden door seemed to rumble as they heaved it shut across the entrance, causing her cute little flaxen head to roar and bumble. Her chains only rattled when she moved. Since she was now all alone, there was no one present to tattle, to tell the world outside of her horrible circumstance. All 'tis so sad, now..., ever so sad, that the only crime that she was ever guilty of, was that of spending so much precious time in a dying town among such envious, spiteful, narrow minded people, who were such a dreadful bore..., yes.., only this sole crime.... and nothing more.
          Through her streaming tears she vaguely saw the mouse scampering about as she continued to cry, running to and fro through that old stick house. Then once again she heard a gentle tapping, and her now tearful heart..., suddenly felt very happy! There was just no real explanation as to why.
         “What is your name,” suddenly asked a cheerful voice on her right side? “My name is Milton Mouse,” said the happy little voice. “ I am the owner of this house.”
         “Oh you, the owner of this house,” asked Allison while straining through her tears again, sniffing them down as she spoke? “Well, my name is Allison,” she replied with another sniffle.
         “Now cheer up, cause I have some good news,” declared in joy, the owner of the stick house. “I can get you out O here, just as quick as a whiffle! So please, do tell me, if you were free again to choose, wouldn't that get rid of those infernal blues?”
         “Oh me.., oh my...,” the little girl replied, “oh indeed so, and may God bless! Why, I have been so sick inside here..., outside is sure where it is that I am free. It is there where I wish to abide, so far away from this town for ever more, where all of the people act like such silly dumb clowns! The truth can never hide...All do know this now, we live in a mighty pathetic place that is such a depressing, messed up bore!”
         “So th,” the mouse said, “just watch me,” then he raced through the locks like a latch key, causing those old locks to snip and snap, and lose their grip. The antique chains did clink and clatter as they so reluctantly fell, and then that poor little girl suddenly felt well, for behold all....,it was now she who was forever free. Most surly she now had the energy to run like a silver zip!
         The mouse then stood cleverly by saying, “just watch me again,” He then looked out toward the dense wooded thistle, now placing his fingers upon his lips, making a shrill whistle. Out from the thistle now did run a thousand mice, not townsmen. The thousand mice were really nice, much nicer than all the women or men, had ever been to poor little Allison.
          Upon that great wooden door they did swarm and chew, until the wood was all tattered, in pieces and unglued. From it's rusting hinges it finally fell, even though all of those townsmen had put it together very well. Into the sunny outside now did little Allison run..., never to be bound in locks or chains again.
          So deep into that misty wilderness did that little girl run, that she could romp and play with jolly elves, rabbits and deer just for fun. She swam across the deepest river with prancing leaping fish..., for in her mind, she had only one sole motivating wish..., and that was just to be forever free...
          So one cold, dreary, misty day, the townspeople came to that old stick house, that sat ever so quiet and still with just one mouse.  They were all so greatly shocked to hear from poor little Allison not a single weeping peep... ,for when they peered deep inside they found that truly now..., she did abide forever free....as she lay all frozen still in that deep eternal sleep...
          So now an endless perpetual sadness fell upon that town of such dark, terrible, most dishonorable sin, for they had forever lost little Allison, who was to never come back again. Now the timeless judge determined them to be just as guilty as the most horrible of men, and as to the day of prosperity and peace, why, they would never know when. So now it was that they were forever doomed to only begin again, repeatedly making the same old foolish mistakes for all eternity. Then finally the holy cherub in heaven did say,
          “let the eternal flame be the fate for all those narrow-minded, rude, spiteful people of Stenzilland,” and finally it was so for all infinity and more..., doomed for the sins of lashing out upon innocents..., and and for being unto all others such a dreadful, mind numbing bore.