The Entertainers
Poems
and linocuts
by John Gibbens
Published
7th June 2004
A5, 28pp, stapled, card cover
ISBN
978-0-9539153-7-8
£6.00
A celebration of the circus ring and the stage through 10 theatrical characters – bareback rider and conjuror, juggler and high-wire walker, Harlequin and Pierrot, the ringmaster, the ventriloquist and the tragedian – along with their presiding deity, Hermes. Each is illustrated with an inkjet print taken from a linocut – three in black and white and eight in colour.
Juggler
This seems autonomous symmetry
and not my doing.
I stand and let it spring from me
as the first cause,
rise, return and fly, while I,
transported,
follow the respiration of the spheres.
It’s
Brahma who swings the clubs, Vishnu
keeping them spinning
and painting the space with their speed,
till by Shiva’s
hand, a fine fling done, they’re drawn
down and ceased,
like the life where you look for such order.
Go
to the Trading Post to buy The Entertainers