Two Amsterdams

Narrated by Bill Wolak

New Jersey

Two Amsterdams

By Lawremce Ferlinghetti

 

A voyage through the Low Countries

and tilted Amsterdam

like a huge barge in a bottle

a blown glass city

listing on its tides –

In the hotel café

They have huge rugs on the table

Dutch burghers munching mutton

while I sit here longing

for the Transsiberian Express

the wild taiga

beyond Zima Station

And the wide open spaces

Between Ship Rock and Taos

high flat mesas like islands

or ships adrift

in the desert

Indians in undented black felt hats

And prairies in sun

seas of wheat in wind

off the Great Lakes

Or the running sea

Sweeping in

off Cape Ann Gloucester

Or the wild North Sea

due North of here

Vikings beating windward

through the white nights

Norwegians in open boats

Escaping theNazis

No more macho heroes here

among the potted rubber plants!

Yet not far away

Throw-away heroes rocking on stage

at Paradiso dance hall

Amsterdam Fillmore Auditorium

stoned captain at the helm

with stand-up mike swung like a sword

to the sound of the sea crashing

on splintered timber

The deck quivers

to the boomed electric beat

The Ship tilts

the crew roars

in Liverpool accents

the naked hero-bodies crash

beyond the Milky Way

And in the blown-out dawn

Nudes struggle home

Through alleyways