My grandfather ate a horse’s hoof once.

Not all in one go. He nibbled and gnawed at it over the course of several days
(maybe weeks). That’s how he survived the war. That’s what he told my dad and
that’s what my dad told me. I think about that hoof a lot. More than is probably
normal or healthy. I think about what it must have tasted like. Did the hoof have any
hair around the top? Did he eat that too? I think about these things at stop signs, in
the snack food aisle, when I’m using the tired brown remnants of an SOS pad to
scrub the lasagna pan.
I assume he kept the hoof in his pocket. Since all the prisoners had gone mad with
starvation, he had to hide his treasure somehow. When I feel into the bones of his
ghost, I see his hollow body in that striped uniform, crouching down behind his
barracks. His stick fingers slide into his pocket and he wraps them around the hoof
(this is when he would salivate without saliva). He looks around with his empty eyes
before pulling the hoof out of his pocket and licking it like soft serve. When he’s
satisfied, he puts the hoof back in his pocket, stands up, and walks away.
I can never get the lasagna pan clean. There’s always a baked on bit of something
charred. Something unmovable.

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Krista Raspor is a creative nonfiction writer living in Toronto. Her work has been featured/is forthcoming in The Fiddlehead, The Globe and Mail, and as part of the CBC First Person series. She writes about living with a disability, travel, and the moments that take on weight when examined closely.