Amsterdam Cantos (y poemas pistos)

                              

                                VO Hotel
                                family has invited me 
                                to attend
                                party for their daughter, 
                                will go to the Melk Weg later 
                                to read and trip 
                                17 sept 78

            Reception

  reception
  for impending wedding,
  stolid european faces
  from different sounding places, 
  they look so proper, 
  so impeccable and sane, 
  correct stances,
  they sip cognac, genever,
  beer, café au lait, tea,
  munch
  on delicate/exquisite cakes,
  tiny sandwiches,
  all so prim

  until
  next door neighbors
  remonstrate
  about pissing dogs,
  parking places,
  and lash out
  with antisemitism phrases,
  and my hosts
  wrack havoc,
  damn, but all hell breaks loose, 
  rage and turbulence caroom, 
  it's a sidewalk feud 
  as fists lash out, 
  and that gentle lady 
  who graciously 
  served me 
  breakfast 
  now hurls out 
  slavic/nordic/nederlander expletives, 
  imagery of dachau 
  where she left her family 
  in the ashes of racism 
  skim off
  her violent words,

  demons & other psychological maelstroms 
  burst out/about, 
  spiteful ventilation, 
  the primness of the moment 
  lies in shards,
  beneath what I had thought
  to be complacent
  seethes still
  the horror of the past ...