A BLEMISH IS LIKE A CIRCUS A blemish is like A CIRCUS A blemish is round and unsmooth and unsteady A sitting duck in a pond, in a pock Like a circus it rolls and it shudders and frays Like stilts it sways in its steady-board silt And it sticks to its rubber And yells in its tunnels It needs to stay Pie slap and whipped cream It can't escape the scarring It needs to echo, can't escape its upkeep It needs to spatter and lick and cling Without losing its beeping and bouncing and this-that Sweep up the lad-and-lass canvas of messes Hopscotch of rashes and patterns like patchwork Inside the clean-as-sky tent like a beach ball Hay near the edges of blemish town tickles Bridges the webbing and tooting of dawn-frock. Written in 2006. Poetry