Amsterdam

Amsterdam rests easy on that temporal shore,

Exhibiting a cosmopolitan beauty that doth have no echo.

Central Station is her greeting place,

Set firm and steadfast beneath a seamless sky.

 

Damrak, trams and tourist traps,

Strange faces and images, juxtaposed canal-side.

With bridges systematically racing to embrace,

Centuries, merchant clad, cobbled streets.

 

Dam Square, Palace and War Memorial opposite,

Bathed in summer light.

Where students pause and tourists gather,

To exchange Saturday cares.

 

Ice cream, cheese and cans of beer. 

Coins drop,

As the music of a barrel organ, 

Enthusiastically fills the air.

 

The joy of Rokin revelling,  

In the chill of an autumn night.

Vondelpark, Anne Frank's House and the Rijksmuseum.

A metropolitan mecca for idealists,   

With aspirations high in their eyes.