Carnival
by Sandy Florian

The town of starry tents that travels static roads.  Or.  The parking lot that blossoms overnight.  And.  The blare of the calliope.  The bark of the bagman.  Or.  You stand heavenly over heathens in search of wide horizons.  Or.  The leaf of the heliotrope.  But.  If the time devoted entirely to pleasure intervenes between Boxing Day and Ash Wednesday, you bring the same symmetry of that old clock and compass to the nose of the clown.  Or.  To the coin you twist between your fingers.  You toss your dazzling dime onto your lucky number and watch the whirl of the wheel of chance.  While I, dressed in my sideshow sequins, tip my top hat to show.  It is the season of the unadorned rabbit.

If the time devoted entirely to pleasure intervenes between the box and its ashes, the history of the word is illustrated by the parallel name Carnem Laxare.  See.  This history is hung without a witness.  For.  As you watch without distraction your whirling world, the magician flashes the saw and the box.  While I, bidding farewell to my flesh, wave goodbye from the stage with my stiff unfisted hands.

In France, it is comprised of Jeudi gras, Dimanche gras, Lundi gras, and Mardi gras.  Elsewhere, the carnival of my sweet love is past.  Now comes the lent of my long hate.  For.  The elephant only allows himself to be led by drivers whom he has adopted.  And.  It’s the French who say, When the Devil gets old, he becomes pious.

The monster who bares her breast from the balcony on Bourbon.  And.  The man in the mask and the skeleton costume.  But.  If the time between.  The Box.  The Ash.  The Rabbit.  And the Hat.  Your whirling dervish slows on still numbers.  Our Mother screams from the apex of old Ferris.  And.  Our Clown is brought to tears again.  As.  You stand in vertical anticipation.  And I, seeking the accident of your attention, climb horizontal into the box and wait for the onslaught of carnage.

[Note:This poem was first published in Upstairs at Duroc, the literary journal of WICE, a non-profit anglophone women’s organization serving the international community in Paris. Check out Upstairs at Duroc.]

Other poems by Sandy Florian in ActionYes #3:
Clock
Roulette