Bernard Henrie - Casino del Amor

When she speaks Spanish
her lips are scented with jacaranda.
In the bath I see her convex belly
from childbirth and childbirth again.
You can tell she is from a big city.
Straight toes, high foot arch,
bleached teeth, the unwrinkled hands.
Her voice and familiar forms of address
she uses on the promenade deck
for stray children, or her own
on radio telephone back in Lima.

Dead give aways, her hairless thighs,
smooth spaces high into her clothes,
the scented acacia under a naked waist
like a bloom in the Patagonian steppes.

The moist wattle a jewel case kept hidden
from night thieves.

She kisses with a cigarette in her hand
and gets drunk on my body. She bites my leg
and shoulders, she wounds with her kisses,
her mouth painted red as burning matches.

By turns she calls 'mi amour' or 'papa'
or 'patron.'

I am drugged by her body,
I trespass her body, I become a criminal
thinking how she walks,
my clothes open and fall in disarray,
the puma of our excitement opens its claws.
I think of a forest fire, slate white light
heats our room, an ermine fur of luxury
falls and surrounds us in pleasure.

Later, an Autumnal eclipse enters the room
and my head cools. As I recompose
she gives me money for the ship casino.
The rouge-red carpet and baccarat tables
green as the tumbling ocean waves.

Tomorrow she gambles with a new croupier.

Bernard Henrie

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