The stripes and spots and speckles
of
lions, leopards, and tigers
rise
and spin and fold under the disco ball,
turn
upside down, legs splayed,
delayed
by fingers stroking chrome
as
the roving lights lick the carousel
with
beams on seams of skin-tight silk,
of
tawdry fur and feather boas
constricting
the neck and nexus
of
the gyre, the gyration well-lubricated
with
gin and rose oil rhymed, timed
to
make the fluid hemispheres revolve
around
the son of man who has come
to
call this flock to savannah’s trial
in
a kingdom where the many mansions
are
in the back, red velvet and black lights
ushering
in a rapture of Midwest conventioneers
walking
the midway between the breast of dawn,
between
the gasp and lickety leers
and
twilight’s last suckle of a naked gleam.
The
ups and downs exist but in a dream.
All
are actors, and all who enter here are sprites
who
may have given you to slumber for a while.
Stuff
the greenbacks into the collection plates,
the
order of the garter and the snakes,
and
you shall find yourselves at home again,
the
wife and kids, asleep, bringing the ship to rights.
~William Hammett
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