CARNIVAL celebrates the quirky, the odd, and an audience of participants and voyeurs. The first section contains linked poems that focus on small towns' annual festivals. The second, "Sideshows," looks at fictional, mythic, and real characters from a speculative angle. The third, "The Traveling Circus," centers on one of mankind's oldest entertainments. CARNIVAL unleashes a vibrant and revolutionary spirit in poems that favor a skewed vision: sometimes effervescent, often dark.