Ravi Shankar is assistant
professor and poet-in-residence at Central Connecticut State University.
He is the founding editor of the online journal of the arts
Drunken Boat.
His work is forthcoming or has appeared in such places as The Paris
Review, Poets & Writers, Time Out New York, The
Massachusetts Review, Gulf Coast, Lit, The Indiana
Review, Crowd, Descant, and the AWP's
Writer's Chronicle.
Carousel
Singeing the heels of a quarrel,
Another renewal, with what for fuel?
Is it courage or fear that brings us
Both tears, each unable to leave the other?
Outside, the world displays its devices,
Lures and entices, promises pleasures
Earnest as arsenic and easier than rain.
Which must be why we refrain . . . It's true,
That with you I'm shriven, but remember
When we were children, and joy
