2012 Poem-a-Day April 3rd

A Plate on a Stick

In constant rotation, it has one job-
don’t fall, don’t fall, don’t fall
dependent on someone else’s skill,
always ready to take the blame
when it crashes, the plate endures
blessed by the certain assurance
it will be caught whole in the end.
don’t fall, don’t fall, don’t fall
The rhythmic chant defines:
the spinners’s hands, sticks, plates
in symbiotic motion, unconcerned
with the inevitable pull of gravity,
the shudder growing to a wobble,
don’t fall, don’t fall, don’t fall
but everything does eventually.

Should I have locked the door,
begged you stay? Caught up
in the spectacle, I kept spinning,
thinking you would always be
there to catch me when I fell.