Clown-white painteyes stare
to semicircled rows of semismiles,
finds answer not yet full enough;
angling for new slants in rhombus lines,
he preens, finger-end to skullcap;
sureness springs—he pirouettes and knows
his course, becomes a redwhite moment’s
blur whose pluming triumph
blots in sudden spotlit sprawl.
New growth seeds in rain of rolling
laughter. Clown white inverts
to play an instant’s Harlequin,
whose master japes bamboozle kings,
then tumbles masking blackwards
over Rome and into Greece,
clown diamonds pointing,
bending
all perspective’s ancient chase
past chaste Aegean grape
toward slopes which bear an older fruit
which few know how to pick
but none mistake
when foolswork has gone well.
Stephen Malin, 2016
