Metaphoric Kisses

She made him sit outside
when he smoked,
these cigars smuggled from Cuba,
his parents' homeland,
long johns peeking from
his cuffs, sock hat over
black curls and lidded brown eyes.
The way he rolled his r's
or said It' día hermoso del S.A.
made women's hearts thud
so loudly she wanted to hold
him close, sharpen her nails.
He wrote his best love poems
out there, embered cigar tip
coding red messages against
the growing Michigan dusk.
He read them to her after
in their bed with the Sun 
Goddess headboard and yellow
spread, brought from Miami.

She could taste every enjambment,
every metaphor when he kissed her.


Pris Campbell
©2008


Published in The Smoking Poet, December 2008

Photo: Diego Quiros, poet/artist from Miami, FL
Thank you, Diego, for the use of this photograph!






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