Frank Pietru

I Wonder Why

She’d rung me out of a distance of years.
Didn’t ask how she found the number,
Curiosity is often a devil that way.

I was masochistically early, ordered gin,
Sat in the back, hiding in the half light,
I was reading Pope when she came in.

‘I didn’t recognise you but the book…’
I rose to kiss her, a hand pressed my chest
And awkwardness closed over the night.

She still drank pints but soda and lime
Instead of Directors and Abbott’s.
‘I don’t drink in the week anymore.’

She was married, two kids and a lover
Who could only see her on ...