B.Z. Niditch- Three Poems

THE MAYPOLE

We are passing

to another season

near the Maypole

with fresh sunflowers

in our garden hands

day dreams will survive

all barbed wire

of poisoned jealousy

beyond villages

of freezing grey

in Bleak House

watching a departing poet

as a mourning dove sings

by a sailor lost at Hull

at the light of a small river

after a tourist has been

seen weeping by the shore

in a poisoned pen letter

from his girlfriend

leaves us by cool rocks

under a shadowy orchard

wanting new friends.

OFF THE ISLANDS

Backgammon players

crowd in the shadow

of the hospital ship

off islands of the sea

where adventurer tourists

hear me playing jazz violin

in the warm night air 

risking my music life

no longer poisoned

by motionless lovers

yet abandoned

from a warring girlfriend

of once alarming devotions

now under cold sleepy covers

now my gestures move her

in prayer to forgive me.

 

OUT AT SEA

A poet needs to hear

an all clear signal

by the deserted wind

for exiles on the river run

or high seas

that we tremble at this hour

when the air turns cool

by the ocean's sandy beach

near the rocks and stone

of this home harbor

a solitary hawk draws us

emerged from the dunes

he too was searching for

the living waters and bread

in a passport of memories

pausing at a shore to search

for food not poisoned

by tourist traps.