for a traveling circus acrobat

You swing here from the East
where nothing is dusty —

just diesel and domes. Where
church spires are syringes

flushed from earth like
strung-out doves, pinpricked

vessels of stupor. Here, cows
cluster in gangs. They chaw

and low. I wish you’d unhook
my blouse, sewn from spit

and calico. But aloft, you sweat
your way through your spiraling

grabs: hand, twist, air — hand.
The dumb meat weight of you

pikes, curls back on itself
like a peeled plum’s skin —

one scared to be caught
staring by the knife. Still

what’s left to risk, or fear? Fists,
maybe. Rope burn. The perpetual

stink of pigs and tractor grease. More
bars like the one you hang from,

showman. But the Big Top’s got
spicier acts than you. Lions seethe

on their stools, their tails like scythes
to slash wheat. And clowns boil

from their red-hot car. They pop
and roll like bath plugs, yanked

from scalded sinks. So, what
would it take for you to blister

your own way down
past the net — the shock

on our Midwestern faces? Are you brave
enough to strike

up a homestead here, in the flattest
form of sky? Fall upwards

at us, like haystacks made you
some sawdust promise: that a girl

would catch you in her
burlap sack. No greater show on

earth: not milk barns. Not flies.
No need to scream on your arrival.