Alice? Who the hell is Alice?

I remember the ugly
brown, green, and orange carpet,
marked with stains and
saturated with Grandma's perfume,
which smelled of the
pent-up frustration I couldn't taste
in my youth.

I remember the bunnies
that ate the carrots under the porch
and the baby bunnies
whose brains were dashed out by
crows across the backyard.

But they were replaced by the bird
whose leg was tied to a branch of
the "climbing tree" my brother got stuck in
when he was six;
and the deer that left tracks in the flowers
and a pile of round pellets by the picnic table,
which smelled and kept me out of the yard all month;
and Chippy, who the cats watched
as he dug tunnels under the lilacs and
roses.

I remember the naughty chicken
and eating sweet cherry tomatoes like candy
and the glue my brother put in his macaroni and cheese one morning,
just to see if
it tasted like the macaroni and cheese
at our grade school,
which stuck fast in the tin-foil tray,
even when you tipped it upside down,
and clanged in the metal trash can,
like in the story I told for years.

I remember the rope swings
strung up in Grandpa Willow
(even though he is an elm),
whose long root beard
was dotted white with
bird poop,
and I remember my mom
squinting through her thick,
90's-round glasses,
trying to see him.

I remember my dad's country;
chasing fireflies at the family reunion,
where everyone spoke southern
and the Devil went Down to Georgia.

I remember Barbie's and Polly Pockets.
I remember Bonne Bell and Lip Smackers,
that convinced me that bright blue was
just the right color
when I finally started wearing eye shadow.

I remember Harry Potter
and waiting for Hagrid to come for us
on our eleventh birthday
and the truth or dare game I left at Kayla's house
the night everything changed.