Some never felt at ease among the mainland trees,
setting up, instead, a travelling circus, mastering the high trapeze,
silks, aerial hoops and tumbling; one spinster even began
unpinning her bun’s cluster to be dangled by a hair-hang
rig as she twisted in her leotard high above all those
who came to watch and cheer them in Montreal, New York, Montrose…
An amazing array of acrobats, they astonished spectators, too,
with the tight-rope and lasso, imagining they were whirling tight loops through
storms gusting across Conachair, fastening knots
taut around a promontory, each jutting slab of rock,
while juggling a clutch of fulmar eggs, aware that if they fell
there would be so much more splattered than just yolks and shells.