Point of Americas II
1976
Comb-bound: 65 pp.
Published: 1998
Price: $9.95
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Brodsky composed the forty-one poems in Point of Americas II during the spring and summer of 1974. The first and last sections of the book detail his visits to Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where he and his wife "delight in being elements of an endless day," capturing the relaxed mind’s reflections on walking the beach, watching the sun set or storm clouds gather, and observing sunbathers, boaters, and the lush surroundings, all in contrast to the middle section’s study of Midwestern life as seen by a poet content to spend weekdays camouflaged as a plant manager and Sunday mornings surveying simple activities at home or around the town square.
Seascape
Royal palm trees lean easterly.
Winds rifle the beach with sandy rain.
The shrill void fills with noise, like steam
Blowing a bolted lid off an exploding kettle.
Despite the storm, three sailboats
Penetrate the low fog and are lost; a plane
Churns the wet air and, like the rusty tanker
That left harbor an hour ago, disappears
Beyond the scope time defines by its horizon.
Now, all that remains is the jagged ocean,
A slime-green leviathan showing its teeth,
Its mouth open to ingest the whole beach.
