Man on a Bicycle

39047-Brassai_Marlene
The man, to make a living,
had plastered hundreds of faces
upon walls, but there was something about this one
which held him captive. It wasn’t just
the stardom of her name, its siren-call,
but the sheer magnitude
of artifice, its grotesque beacon,
which brought the man back
to the carnivals of his boyhood,
when the radiant symmetry
of illusion and promise
was in startling bloom,
and not yet thinning out
to wither.

 

(Photo by Brassai)
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About John Biscello

Originally from Brooklyn, NY, novelist, poet, performer, playwright and filmmaker, John Biscello, has lived in the high-desert grunge-wonderland of Taos, New Mexico since 2001. He is the author of six novels, Broken Land, a Brooklyn Tale, Raking the Dust, Nocturne Variations, No Man’s Brooklyn, The Last Furies, and No One Dreams in Color; a collection of stories, Freeze Tag, two poetry collections, Arclight and Moonglow on Mercy Street; and a fable, The Jackdaw and the Doll, illustrated by Izumi Yokoyama. He also adapted classic fables, which were paired with the vintage illustrations of artist, Paul Bransom, for the collection: Once Upon a Time, Classic Fables Reimagined. His plays have been staged and performed both nationally and internationally.
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