“In the Circus of You” is a uniquely written poem that expresses a duo experience of a fictional life and the real life situations coupled with the perceptions of the people as they go about their lives. This uniqueness is apparently the artwork of two individuals, Nicelle Davis, and Cheryl Gross, who have merged the epic and the private aspects of a poem to yield its delicacy and intelligibility. In this novel-in-poems illustration, the author describes the struggles that a certain woman is going through while at the same time exploring the real world that we are in as a sideshow. As such, the human beings find it difficult to measure their level of sanity due to the experiences they go through daily because they are described as mere on-lookers.

Thesis statement: The poem displays the human beings as confused individuals who behave like freaks and are not sure of how ‘normal’ they are or how ‘normal’ they need to be.

The poetry by Davis and images used by Gross ally over the different themes of monogamous marriages, rationality, parenthood, creativity and some other abnormalities in life that make us feel human. Dead pigeons talking, as well as the transformation of the human bodies into creatures that are purely sensory, depict the illusion, the art of personification and other universalities of this poem. The words stated by the author, “Neck broken, attached by veins and skin, its head lies atop talons/kicks its own face towards my front gate,” show that personification has a role in the poem (1, 2). Drawing together at the point of a show or a poem is a way of being able to become alive with each other, as there is that synergy in individuals, places, and art.

The “In the Circus of You” poem, the author expresses and mythologizes agony and disgust that people go through in life. More also, the poets are not exempted as they are subject to the catastrophes just like other people. Consequently, whatever the feeling or the message that the poets establishes in the poem reflects what he/she has experienced or has seen other people go through. Thus, poetry should not be viewed as mere literature but as a platform that examines the experience people go through and helps in solving the crises in question. The empirical technique used in this process is quite amazing because it is never easy to express what you have experienced. As such, the “In the Circus of You” poem acts more in a confessional narrative by showing the ambiguity, and complexity of the state that the poet was in at a certain time. Nicelle Davis’ “In the Circus of You” poem lives in a world away from the comfort zone to an intense world of open-mindedness that runs on a rough terrain that is less comfortable. The sharp edges of the poem and the illusions depicted by the language used in the poems articulately align to the drawings and images that Cheryl Gross uses when translating Davis’ poetry. Through such a style, Cheryl Gross The factor between Davis the poet and Cheryl Gross, the artist, is such a huge bonding that it explodes beyond the boundaries of the genre, ‘self-identity’ as an “illustrated novel-in-poems.”

Through this aspect of the collaboration between the two individuals, there developed a perfect revelation where the poet finds it difficult to foretell what the artist has in mind or sees. On the other hand, the artist finds it amazingly thoughtful by trying to comprehend the power of the words used in suggesting the images. Nevertheless, Cheryl Gross does not illustrate an absolute contribution to the hidden meaning of the poem, even though his images are coded in the same way as the message in the poem. For instance, the cover of the book has an amazing visual cast that can be used to provide a definite explanation of what is going on. The freakish human-like beasts could be used to symbolize how freakish the life or the mind of the poet is as well as that of all the human beings. as they hold up and check their mobile devices. While looking closely at the images, it is possible to identify a certain horse-like creature that is checking a mobile device too, making the image look funny and express the metaphor for divided attention. As such, the image depicts the shredding attention that lead to the traumatic effects of divided attention on humans as they go about their daily activities.

As much as the poem is composed of a larger part of imagination and Moreover, the poem “In the Circus of You” drives the reader into assuming a complex sideshow of a world that makes them feel freaky as all the concepts in the text are freakish and confusing. The poem calms the reader’s initial shock and creates a wonderful experience out of the horrifying situation by instilling confidence and the reader’s presence in the poetic environment. Additionally, the poem and images used express the struggles related to motherhood, parents divorcing, as well as living as an individual with mental disorders. These are all the messy situations that a “normal” human being finds himself or herself in, and they should, therefore, accept the situations and recognize them as part of the human nature. These “abnormalities” make it difficult for the author to put them into words including the mess they create, which makes the poem to triumph, as poetry does not revolve around mere words.

Conclusion

Nicelle Davis uses disfigured pigs, desiccated pigeons, and a mix of musical poems to indicate the loss that human beings experience and deal with them privately to look strong before the rest of the world. The poem “In the Circus of You” displays grace as well as the terrible beauty in the society we are in by use of smooth poetic music. It also explains the human life through the simple but detailed drawings, with body parts replaced by wheels as an aspect of personification.

Works Cited

“IN THE CIRCUS OF YOU, by Nicelle Davis and Cheryl Gross.” A Cappella Zoo. Rose Metal Press (Spring 2014), 2011. Web. 13 May 2015. <http://www.acappellazoo.com/frominthecircusofyou>.