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2002 PAGE 6 Len Roberts Talking on the Telephone Thirty years later I try to remember the telephone number back on Olmstead Street, see the black base and speaker I took into the cold hallway those long winter nights I talked to all the girls I loved. Inside the warm kitchen my mother and father whispered, now and then the click of dishes set into the sink, the pop as the top snapped off another Schaefer's bottle, but out there it was wind drafting under the front door, finding its way up the stairs to where I would sleep, wind coming in from the back, too, down the long corridor with its one dim light. Hello Mary, hello Suzanne, Dee Dee with the blue angora sweater, how are you tonight, I wish you were here, and then the Drifters started to sing "Save the Last Dance for Me," my feet moving in time against the dark wallpaper, my nose and hands chilled, becoming numb while their voices flowed into my warm ear.
© All Copyright, Len Roberts.
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