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      August 10, 2021The Circus of Inconsolable LossWendy Taylor Carlisle

      There is only one ring for those sweating horses with the preternaturally
      flat backs and the fat smooth rumps from which ladies
      in stained tights vault onto the sawdust
      or another horse.

      Only one ring for the hung-over clowns and their Volkswagen,
      a car so old it must be pushed into the one ring
      which is also the one for the acrobats and the tigers and contortionists
      and dogs that walk on their hind legs,

      then stop to scratch their necks, itchy under spangled ruffs. Above them
      wire walkers and trapeze guys swing,
      mayfly-graceful. Under them the one ring
      reminds the audience to celebrate, each in their own

      constrained and special way,
      the emptiness they’ve come to in the spaces where other rings should be.

      from #32 - Winter 2009

      Wendy Taylor Carlisle

      “This poem was a gift from the circus backyard in my head where a population of freaks and wire walkers, butchers and roustabouts, folks who work animals, a ringmaster and Tom Thumb are careful to keep the elephant’s trunk up for the photograph, don’t whistle in the dressing room and never look back when marching in a parade. The poem arrived about a year ago, the form later. I write poetry because I can’t help it. Given the choice, I’d be a magician, a jockey, or a diamond cutter.”

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