Seeing Double. Some people think Amsterdam is a city of sin. But it is actually a city of freedom, and in freedom most people find sin.
*How to read this Amsterdam poem: “Seeing Double” can be read in the left column alone, the right column alone, and from left to right as an entire poem. The left side is centered on a park musician statue photo, and the right side is centered on a woman working in the red light district.
MONUMENTS OF MUSICIANS red lights like Great Gatsby eyes Amsterdam bathes in leaves opens 10 am, black curtains crawling yellowing like book pages people behind glass everything is falling out of trees a woman’s fingernails beckoning onto the bronze man’s scalp window display turned human, moving he plays on when does she sleep best bass player in town when does she go home he knows liberty in a single strand of hair brushed sideways spinning his instrument like a paintbrush swaying her hips to her own whistling Van Gogh sitting in the park audience in her own maroon world right along with him a heel four inches off the ground singing in Dutch no waver in her undressed silence red hair tapping the wind like a foot pressing a piano pedal: “play on, risky city, play on”
