Forge

[Lizzie]

Well, DQ, not finding that much to pick at since you're amazing, but a couple of things:

            She was a contortionist sword-swallower and a failure. Love the unexpected 'failure' right off the bat. Her brother, estranged, was a contortionist sword-swallower and strongman with a business, producing bespoke throat bent ironwork. I don't understand why especially he needs to be estranged. I get the sibling rivalry, but we're not told how or why the relationship decayed to this level.
            He'd won prizes. He had a profile in the New Yorker, he was an artist. She was just a performer, touring cross country under a shroud of sawdust and candyfloss. Candelabra and candyfloss are two of my favorite words. Points for making me smile.
                Every evening she draped herself around a blade, bending with the crowd's ooos. She was a candelabra of cutlasses, a human vane in the night-wind.  But no matter how good her act, she was not satisfied. For each time the supple metal righted itself, impressed only with the ghostly slick of her gut. 
                The tent was put up and taken down. The people blew in then out. The blade inserted and withdrawn. Limbs switched and returned. Her pointless manoeuvres left no imprint upon the sword. I'd drop 'pointless' -- the fact that she's not having the desired effect on the sword conveys this already.
                 The taste of metal lingered. She billowed and bloomed like a jellyfish, transparent and torpid. Her coiled body a fallow tract, a whorl to nowhere, animated only when she put her sword in. To me this reads as if it's missing a 'was' in between 'body' and 'a', unless you meant for 'animated' to be the verb, in which case I'd punctuate differently: 'Her coiled body -- a fallow tract, a whorl to nowhere -- animated....' Otherwise the first bit leads the reader to think there's no verb at first because two clauses are separating the noun and verb. It's confusing.

She was a contortionist sword-swallower and a failure, accordingly. Her brother, estranged, was a contortionist sword-swallower and strongman with a business, making bespoke throat bent ironwork. He'd won prizes. He had a profile in the New Yorker, he was an artist. But she was  just a performer, touring cross country under the smell of sawdust and candyfloss.
                Every evening she draped herself around a blade, bending with the crowd's ooos... she was a candelabra of cutlasses, a human vane in the night-wind.  But no matter how good her act, she was not satisfied. For each time the supple metal righted itself, removed edge straight again; impressed only with the ghostly slick of her gut.
                The tent was put up and taken down, the people blew in then out, the sword inserted and withdrawn, limbs switched and returned. Her manoeuvres left no imprint upon the sword. All was pointless.
                 Her self-doubt deepened. Her coiled body, a fallow tract, a whorl to nowhere. She became her own slowest torturer. The roars of the dusk audience dimmed.  After many years all she could taste was the metal, all the time. When the circus closed she did not move. When her brother died she did not speak. She billowed and bloomed like a jellyfish, transparent and torpid. She only animated when she put her sword in.

(Sorry I know prose poetry looks shit in forum formatting, thanks for reading!)