Lonely Circus

​

This idea has been forming in my mind for years, as a song that

is also a poem -- at least today.

A Very Lonely Circus - by goreyfied -- Digital Art / Photomanipulation / Surreal

Lonely Circus

I am a lonely circus 

and it is starting to show 

The paint is peeling away from the years 

of neglect, though the music still plays

And the players still dance

In the night of their heart's

Delight, in the day of their

Sad discontent

And the secrets they keep

The ones they still know

Oh, how the music is beginning

to slow

The pain of this space, this illusion

Of harmony and precision we have shared

But each is isolated in fear

Like a music box stuck on a tune

that a child keeps winding

Just to see the sad turns

Of the sad, broken dancer

Dizzy, confused, 

and alone

Even in our glory days 

of grand demonstration

and daring display

The crowds were too curious, eyes too wide

They couldn't look away from the awkward

Out of sync repertoire

Too embarrassed to see us as real 

They played the game of the interested crowd

Cheering us on, acting so proud

But what do they see of the circus inside?

Made up of parts that agree to perform

No one knew exactly why 

They felt like they weren't watching talent, 

as much as beckoning tragedy 

Unusual feats of balance 

Like the tiptoeing tightrope artists

and trapeze flyers, not quite suspended

or flying, but not quite falling

There is something to just barely making it

Doing something that is not really anything more

than choosing to nearly die

in a way that attracts the attention

They hope will fill the emptiness

 that continues inside

Especially when given a closer view

There is terror, if you look too far

beneath the surface

If you catch what plays out behind their eyes

A nightmare, 

but there is beauty about it,

What draws you all in, pushes you out

And draws you in every direction

almost

There are moments of grand and exquisite 

performance of striking perfection

That linger as long as the 

Shining shimmers

Ah, ah

That illusion is lovely,

Too fragile to freeze it

Or frame it somehow

as it fades into lonely 

Maybe not the same way 

as the ones 

who are already broken

Animals, not to be trusted

Or the ones who are viewed

For their wondrous ability 

To be disabled, deformed --

Wonders or monsters to fear

or behold?

They feign they don't feel

what the cages they live in 

Remind them to never forget

They are not to be touched

They are dangerous

Different

Not wanted

And what about the one 

who could juggle and swallow fire?

Now he struggles to keep 

all the balls in the air

Now he chokes on the fire and burns his insides

The whole house of his being seems to burn 

as melted desire

Oh, the circus needs all different kinds 

To be lonely it needs to rely 

on absurdity and some mediocrity 

to keep them all just a little off 

to keep them from uniting 

and finding each other 

enough to realize 

how very fleeting a Circus can be.

How easily mocked and quickly defamed

it can become, in a moment

Time to move on

to the next town, but still

The same story

And still they cry

as they enter 

the train, usually soaked

in the storm

that seems like tears

that the sky held back

and saved for the traveling days

..........................................................

*But something compelled me a few years ago 

My friend, a musician I've always admired

I've always wanted to know more

than he has ever let me 

We had this moment of three encounters,

All within one week, it seems

Was it chance or synchronicity?

I may never know

But he finally paused to consider . . . or not

. . . a conversation we started

He began to describe

A Circus life he worked

He lived each summer, 

He shared with everyone

But really with no one, 

the way I could see 

The life of those secrets

that fulfilled him in ways that I knew 

were more than lascivious adventures 

or mad escapes

in the way-too-late of a night. 

They were his in a way that made me covet

something more than his effortlessness --

even when seemingly stressed

More than the sigh of his soothing

musical scores of stories --

or the loneliness in his gaze 

that hummed to a tune of its own

kind of song, that I longed for too long

So he saw

But in seeing I noticed his eyes revealing

the paradox of living 

A fantasy-like, not-quite dream of a life 

that opened a mystery 

of an often overlooked dimension, 

a new understanding of what it means 

to be alive.

So I said something clever without even thinking,

and it might have been the most truth

I have ever spoken . . . 

possibly to anyone, 

I I did not doubt it then.

I do not doubt it now.

To Mr. Tristan, the highly revered, slightly conceited, 

(yet still deeply envied by me) 

composer of moving art 

-- Year-round:

"Maybe your life there is more real than this one." 

For him, that may have been fact. 

He did not disagree.

For this lonely circus it makes us wonder

is there life outside this old tent,

where we hide in shame

where we wonder if any of us

has a name or a reason

to live and be loved?

Is there even one person who would hug us,

and not because they feel bad,

or they need to feel big?

Is there one person who might hold us,

and not be afraid to understand,

and see that with our flaws

We are good?

--Mary Anne Stewart

(Still in process and mostly written as a voice note on my 

phone, 1/14/17)

*Italicized lines are not part of the poem, just thoughts
I was having as part of my process.

Juggling too many things. This is Not Chaos, *Lisa Telling Kattenbraker 

(*Bottom image is a photo of my copy of the print, bought for me by a friend)