It’s White White

It’s winter.
Everything is
winter white.
Angel white.
Cumulus white.
It’s white white.

I heard the milkman just before sunrise.
Thought of hauling myself out of bed.
Knew it was freezing outside, and sure
enough, the milk froze solid. Cream on top
swelling up. Rigid. Rising up the neck of
the bottle just like a razor clam I once saw,
all perky, as if waiting for the next wave.

Anyway, that cold column of cream popped
the gold foil cap right off the top of the bottle.

Now the trick is to rescue that bottle before
magpies can get at it. Those blingy-birds
love gold and silver foil tops. They’ll peck it
and steal off with it. A milkman told me
years ago: Never drink milk that a bird’s
been at – it’ll be swimming rife with them
salmonellas and all those et ceteras.

Anyway, I found the gold cap, it was intact,
and the cream column was untouched, too.

It’s White White

So I had cream
on my cereal.
In my coffee.
White cream.
Thick white.
It’s white white.