He gifted her an ice cream cone.
He gave it to her with a blush.
“I wish it were a precious stone,”
he told her in a quiet hush.
His hands were stuffed into his jeans
of faded denim, while he leaned
In for a kiss from his sweet girl.
Her lipstick marked him on the cheek,
Leaving his head then in a whirl,
As he felt awed and somewhat meek.
To him, she wore a halo bright,
An angel that mystical night.
Years later, his fortune increased
But his girl was still the same,
His romance then did not decrease,
Even after she took his name.
He thought a better gift he’d give,
To celebrate the love they lived.
He gifted her a polished stone,
She was then the one who blushed.
“I wish it were an ice cream cone,”
He told her in that quiet hush.
And, after this, that husband meek,
Still got a kiss upon his cheek.
© Susan Joy Clark 2021
This was written for Linda Kruschke’s paint chip poetry challenge. The challenge this week was to write a stanza or more of a sixain, using four or five of the paint chip words below and one as a rhyming word.
The poem was partially inspired by a story my mother told me that she had read about the actress Helen Hayes and her romance. At one point in her courtship, the man who became her husband gave her a bag of peanuts (maybe at the movies or some event) and told her he wished they were emeralds. Years later, he did give her emeralds and told her he wished they were peanuts. In my poem, peanuts and emeralds became ice cream cone and polished or precious stone. All other details were also fictionalized and, of course, created, to fit in the paint chip words.