POEM OF THE WEEK: The Dutch Sea off Nyack

Shad run and fish hawks circle
around the inland waters soon to be
named the Tappan Zee

I hear bells of Henry Hudson’s “Half Moon”
clang as it sails up the river leading to China
where a Great Wall leads to nowhere.

I dance without shoes on the marsh
between West Nyack and hills of Ramapo.
A doe browses on the trunk of a maple.

I rest on a bench in Dutch Gardens
and count my heartbeats. Is my pacemaker
behaving as I doze and dream of America?

Harry Waitzman