I lied!

I forgot about this one I wrote a few months ago:

The Day the Milk Turned Sour

Over puddled cobblestones
she tromped,
arms overfilled
with eggs, bread, cheese,
and milk -
groceries bound for
home, bundled in
brown paper.
Down,
down,
down,
she plodded and slogged
to where the picket gate,
nudged by hip,
opened to a stone walkway.

Even nearing death, when
the dementia had stolen
names of children,
faces of grandchildren,
and most everything else from
her mind, she
could still recall every
inch of that day, when
brown loafers led
little feet over
worn stones
to the whitewashed
walls of her childhood.

Yes.
Every footfall, every
rock's delicate sheen, every
stretch of impossible moss
overwhelming the path,
every piteous ant
that discovered itself in her line,
every damned scent that
entered her nostrils
would be remembered;
on the day milk
smash-spilled on linoleum
and snaked below the icebox,
where, untended to,
it befouled the usually
immaculate kitchen - the day
my Gran found her
father there,
head in oven.

Copyright, Catherine Young, 2012.