The twilight, infused with stray streetlamp light,
Was having a weird effect on your eyes
Making them look green with big red pupils
Like stuffed olives in a dream.
They rolled along with the
Baby stroller bundles
On that glistening unfrozen sidewalk
Which we thought was peculiar,
As if the bricks were drenched in vodka.
You were waiting impatiently
For the snow to finish falling
And for my sinking ship of a brain
To recall the last time we talked-
When you told me the story
About the red-roofed villa
With the crumbling brick chimney
Remember? Re-mem-ber?
It was on the day you dropped off
The last of the pink-ribboned holiday care baskets
To the house with the saved greyhound
Who was sleeping rib boned, red-belled,
On the front porch
Next to a pile of wood drying out to be burned.
It was Christmas, or just after
We tried to be quiet for the hound and for the wood
But when we rang the bell and the heavy door opened
The party inside was loud
And everyone smelled like their kitchens and fennel
Remember that day?
Bundled babies
Vodka sheen
Raw boned and breathing
I searched my sunken ship
And finally recalled the red-roofed villa
Oh! With the crumbling chimney
And the bricks that tumbled down,
Leaving divots in the lawn!
Excited to please you,
I remembered imagining the of chunks of green earth
Rebounding in the spring
From the pounding of the bricks,
From the story you told me about Tuscany in May
Finally you said, you remember
Remember this? It was just before we parted.
