Tonight's Poet Corner: The Nile

The Nile
by Belinda Roddie

On the Nile one day,
a majestic ship of white princesses
with their hair frizzed
and lips red
careened across the currents
kicking algae to the rocks

and the voice of the Nile said,
go forth, and paid no heed
to the wreckage of life and
broken shore the princesses left behind.

Then a little boat teetered
across the troubled foam
where a girl in boys' clothing
asked for safe passage

but the Nile
coiled up like a snake and
refused to hear her, sealing its
watery ears to pleas and honest cries.

And as the boat crashed, the girl fled
and took the weary road instead.