Old poem, new version

Noite de cão

This is one of them no-show nights.

Her man gets sidetracked on the way home,

  some old friend who pops up, lights up

bright as the orange bulb of a  street lamp

just as a fog sets over the city.

'Man, where you been all these years?'

and grins as wide as embraces, as

 they slump down at the  bar on the corner

on  red stools with yellow foam

gaping  from  cracks, and  the glasses

 go empty, one after another, as

 the night shrinks before them, stories

winding up and up and then down

 again, just like a life when it gets 

 stuck at the place  no doors
              want to open.

Back at her place

his lady is sleeping, television blaring and the telephone

off the hook buzzing alone into the madrugada.