Cigar Ode

I should probably crack a window
but it’s cold out there and I’m damned
if I’m going to sit here and freeze
while lighting you up. Anyone
can tell you, bad boy’ll stink the joint up.
They’d be right. You know good and well
that you’re a foul little punk bastard.
A lanky hood with a blue handball
who only stops bouncing it on the stoop
to help Momma Balsoalto carry groceries.
Come on, boy. We’re going to loiter in the sun.
We’re going to linger through the park,
backed in the low riding bucket seats
twenty miles per hour past picnic tables,
part a parade of crossing road geese.
It takes forever. We’re chilling too long,
and I’m smoked full, wafting down
like a silver crinkled balloon after a long day
settling into the grass, my green matching
lawn. That’s what I get. You’re too much.
I skipped lunch to chill with you, bad influence.
A killer every time. Not even three-thirty
and you’re in the wind, miles from my cold sweat,
dried leaf guts pile, pale green. Green.