Circus

 

 

 

Sometimes a bluesky day overrepresents itself.

The short circuits aren’t crackling in ways

The electric company can fix.

Instead, the mind pulses on

Complicated and frantic.

 

The tight rope walker goes

Off to the left and falls

The bear comes down

Off his ball and cries

The tiger roars to his own tune

And then bites the head off

His trainer and escapes onto Main Street

Where he is promptly shot

By rather impervious deputies.

 

The blacktop is bleeding and broken into clumps

From where the elephants made their truths known

One guy who jingle jangles their trunks full of old peanuts

Turns beet red when the kids ask why he’s whipping Dumbo.

 

 

Anne Tibbitts lives and writes in Jefferson  County, Missouri. She teaches part time at Jefferson College in Hillsboro, MO. Anne’s poems have appeared in several publications including Mothering Magazine.