Old Mugs and Broken Trophies
Zoe Davies
My grandmother died two weeks ago,
Yesterday we went to her second house in the Cotswolds
to see what memories we could pillage,
From old mugs, and broken trophies
from long ago dancing competitions when her bones weren’t quite so brittle,
It felt strange, stealing from a house no one lived in,
But I knew she’d expected this,
Maybe even done it
for family and friends that met their ends before she did,
My father’s cousin warned me to only take things that had a sentiment,
This was before he claimed the expensive tea set
Nan had been saving for the pope
Or for her father, whom her Alzheimer’s insisted was still alive,
And hadn’t died in jail when she was fifteen.