b.z. niditch | parisian dream

PARISIAN DREAM

The tenth trick
on your jazz violin
going beyond
Saint-Saens’,
with every body language
cropped from your dream
of having to perform
Thais meditation
practicing in a Paris attic
knowing romanticism
has left its mark
on your body language
after last night
listening to
Josephine Baker
being interviewed
when art deco
and Josephine appeared
here at the same time
in my stoic dream
as her red gown
is being thrown off at me
by the plates
of foie de gras
you hardly touch
only nibble
like a Creole goddess
asking me
to stay the night
recalling how you played
the Plantation
to great applause
back in the States
and even though
you dine with a table mate
poet and violinist
you are still sad
by your baroque dresser
full of theater playbills
flowers and gold watches
near the France miniature
and imitation snuff box
of Anatole,
you are in full
panic attack mode
as white and red pills
fall from your gown
this poet munches on toast
politely asks a notebook
and cups of cognac to cure
his writer’s block
and migraine headache
across this bronzed Salome
a devotee of Venus
on this blue night
costumed jeweled
for your Danse Sauvage
on the floor
as I play Thais
and you sing the aria
to me on a thin bed
in the Arab desert.

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