THE QUIET OF A CAROUSEL

THE QUIET OF A CAROUSEL

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Even the air spun wrong
it felt the blow of leaves like circus bullets
two things that should never happen
a Fair should never run out of ice cream
and a Theater should never close.

Slice the breath with a kitchen knife
space is out sick today
having a hard time catching the sky
the cement paths of the park
emptier than the
the silence of footfalls
that only echo past loneliness.

An assembly of shadows
gather to mourn the loss of realism
swirling and screaming around with
spectral jealousy
why is it
we look at them as extensions of ourselves
but shadows look at us
as what they used to be
not remembering how to call us back
to them.

This can't end good
statues feel the severance of
hands that molded them from
vats of liquid bronze
their likeness to austere form
feels the tendency to melt
beyond recognition of solid mass
now apertures having lost the
human-quality dream.

The rifts and shrills of laughter
weep in another dimension
cascades of grief slide down
walls of alien fortitude
we hear it on Earth
as the change in subtle wind
knocking at our tears
not reasoning why a sound
we cannot hear, only feel it
as the smile that will not
come.

"Something special will come of this,"
says the entrance Billboard with the
face of a scary clown, lips moving
in slow-motion, reinforcing the
petrifying cracking lines of an
exaggerated, painted face.

Why is it
somewhere in this nameless town
a little boy dies
and his memory shuts down
the flow of life and whispers here
he remembers the Cotton-Candy Man
and wonders where he is today. . .

And why for this little boy
do suddenly those wooden horses
on a quiet carousel
come alive with welcoming whinny's
that only HE can hear?