Using city imagery reminiscent of T. S. Eliot's early poems, Toomer in "Her Lips Are Copper Wire" again touches on themes of social connection and interchange. Toomer claimed in his autobiography that he was a (sic)"a natural poet of man's artifices. Copper sheets were as marvelous to me as the petals of flowers; the smell of electricity was as thrilling as the smell of earth after a spring shower." Unlike Eliot, Toomer does not satirize the mechanical image. The two cities in Cane’s middle section, the city of law (the insulated wires) and the city of vision, contradict one another—before vision is achieved, some kind of empathetic connection beyond the law must be made between human beings. When the lover in the poem asks to have the "tape" removed from his lips, he asks for the spark that a kiss will create, that will turn his lips to an "incandescent" glow.

Each of the paired sketches and poems of Cane's middle section presents contrasted elements; "Her Lips Are Copper Wire" is intentionally contrasted with "Calling Jesus." The lovers' ecstatic meeting in "Copper Wire" is set against the "scared" isolation of Nora in the sketch.