Tell the Acrobats

 

                                                            Tell the Acrobats

   Tell the acrobats waiting in the forest clearing

   to pack their circus wagons and leave without me,

   I've had my fill of emptiness spinning around me,

   catching jagged bits of voices flying from the crowd

   like shards exploding from a hammered mirror.

   Slipping from my partner's sweaty palms, I flew

   from that. I'm staying where Chance

   dropped me. Here, the cemetery is the real town;

   the living, in suburban exile, fringe the dead.

   At last, that's all the upward mobility I need.

   Give the ladies, the fat one, the bearded one,

   and the one who's a target to be missed by knives,

   the frayed remnants of my well-worn love.

   Lift up the elephant's ear and whisper that always

   I'll see myself as I was reflected in her sad eye.