The Circle Game

The poem is free-verse, meaning it has no consistent rhyme or meter, which reflects the uncertainty of the poem’s characters. Moreover, while the form is a division into seven sections with stanzas, those stanzas are irregular. Some have only one line and others have six lines, and some lines only have one word. Many of the lines feature enjambment with complete thoughts carrying from line to line and even from stanza to stanza. To top it off, the number of sections, seven, is an uneven number—a prime number, in fact—that defies clean division by any number other than itself (and one). Nevertheless, the number seven (much like a circle itself) has traditionally and mythologically represented perfection and completion.

Moreover, there is further unity in the poem, though it unfolds only gradually. While the poem’s seven sections at first seem disconnected and mysterious, they slowly tie together to reveal a unity, especially in the final section, where the children’s and adults’ storylines come together.