They say a manual pump will help me catch the letdown—the milk that seeps from the other breast when my baby suckles,milk I catch now in a blue cloth I drape over his body,then toss in the wash.

They say if I catch the letdown, maybe I can havea “freezer stash,” each bag of milk stacked brick-like,each bag a unit of time that I can be away from my child.

I don’t catch the letdown, but I pump when I can,cash those bags in like chips—this one to go to the barber, this oneto see a friend, this one for a trip to the library to write.

I say I can’t catch the letdown—because of my chest hair,the pump won’t stick—but maybe I like the sheer dribbling excess,the frantic grasping for a cloth to save my baby’s outfit,the sense of having more than enough.