Letter to Brigid Strong
by Mimmo Iasiello

      
      
Sometimes it's the color red
in a weave or the sun north of Rome
or the rubber band around a two hole punch
          and suddenly I’m there again --
my jacket on the floor,
two cans of beer, Billie Holiday.
We dodged our friends
to get back early, fingers
on buttons, the long sigh
of your zipper.  The mattress springs
groaned and whined
with our weight.  When I think
of how I whispered I've loved you
since that first day, I never thought
it would have led to
skidding down the snow path,
your heel breaking, our first kiss.
I never would have believed
that eight years later
I would remember what you wore,
and how you took it off,
and how it began to snow
as we lay dizzy with alcohol,
Billie crooning for a Lover Man
from the speakers,
the slow February night pushing
in from the corners.