Isobel Dottle
is the perfect name
for a novel’s protagonist’s 
neighbor across the street
particularly a British novel
set in the Cotswalds
in the 1930s
or any decade really
maybe 1990s is best
particularly if there is a piano involved
because yes okay I admit it I did not 
make the name up
she was my piano teacher
and even in seventh grade I wanted
to compose a novel about her
quirks. She is dead now.
She did not like to hear 
my fingernails tapping while I played
and told me to cut them shorter
she told me I held my novel too close
to my face while I waited
for my brother to finish his lesson
she had cats, oh the cats, with a name
like Dottle and so many cats,
and this, this I remember: she requested
a postcard from our trip abroad but noted
dissatisfiedly the local postmark,
accusing us of bringing it home to mail
here, which we did, of course,
being in junior high.