The Water Circus
These birds in hundreds rained like pelt-like kamikazes the day the heavens caved in because of God’s anger.
Man was floating in circles in a boat made of pitch.
Fish were freed to a place of utter mobility.
And the screaming children were swallowed up by the sea.
Inside the fortress, man smelled like the earth, even though the earth was not yet to be seen.
My curious cohorts would play late in their pens of mud,
And furious others clamoured until they fell into sleep.
The old man’s hand was blood-soaked in teeth-marks,
For the floating zoo had no admission park.
And this lonely dove, the soul of God in image,
Found a twig that set every one off,
In the water circus.
--Kevin Smith