Museum Of The City Of...Ii Poem by Morgan Michaels

Behind their frozen forms, behind
the ribbed webs of their flipper-slippers,
in the distance dim
a stern-to-bow-with-garbage-laden scow
calmly plows the current-riven stream.
One unseaworthy old ark, 'way off-
(an obvious ancestor of the Circle Line)
triple-tiered and crammed with fun-seekers-
over whose rail a few vigilants hang
frozen in open-mouthed surprise-
(bringing to mind Auden's 'Musee des Beaux Arts',
but that's neither here nor there)
-to see three wet-suited men dropp from the skies:
eternally expecting a splash that never comes;
and wouldn't a bully pleasure yacht
cruising nearby reveal itself whole, but for that
misadventurous plunge into the frame,
cropping it in halves.
Up in the sky a twin-engine out of La Guardia,
props awhirl,
merrily shreds the clouds.
Then, there is the light shuttlecock of the chopper, itself-
compact, bird-like, blades atop stilled to stilettos,
it's saw mill tail a churning blur,
generating fanfares of light,
to a certain span the water beneath,
whipped to a low boil, a pockmark, an eschar,
like the maelstrom, seen from afar, a gameboard,
into which they imminently plunge.

What were they....