Amid all the exotic sights and excitement of a circus there's one moment which for me holds more daring, beauty and grace than any other. A moment when the clowns cease their pratfalls, while tigers pace and snarl in their cages, elephants shift their bulk from side to side, the ringmaster hushes the crowd, and cross-pathed spotlights illumine upturned faces in scattered circles around the arena as they focus high, high above the ground.

The moment is this: an aerialist lets go of the trapeze and sails and turns, even tumbles, in mid-air. That's the moment. In seconds the flyer will be in the hands of the catcher, who has timed the swing of his trapeze iin such a balance against the motion of the flyer -- a pattern not easily discernible to the audience -- that he will be in just the ri…