Nepals Lost Circus Children + Mary Ellen Mark...

An investigation into the trafficking of Nepalese children to work in Indian circuses. A darker side of circus is exposed and explored by film maker Sky Neal. It follows the Esther Benjamins Memorial Foundation as they rescue children from circuses they have been sold to and taken to a refuge run by a woman called Shailaja CM. They are doing some great work to rid circuses of this archaic and abominable method of recruitment.

See the 25 minute documentary right here.

This is of course not the only side to Indian circus. My first exposure to Indian circus was through Photographer Mary Ellen Marks book 1989 called Indian Circus. I am lucky enough to have a copy I bought from Reg Bolton at a circus festival in Tasmania one year.

Mary Ellen Mark, ‘Twin Brothers Tulsi and Basant’ 

Lessons from the Way of the Showman - 39

A Free Showman can Free the Crowd.

Whispers of the Showman’s Guild

The first time I heard about the Showman’s Guild was from my Dad’s uncle Certini. He was a Norwegian magician and the one who got my father into doing magic. As often happens the Apprentice became a very different magician to his Master. 

Certini was a manipulator. He made cards, coins, thimbles, and lots of cigarettes, appear and disappear at his finger tips. Dad was always more interested in the shows as events and happenings than in the practice of slight of hand. Dad worked miracles with mechanical marvels and electro engeneering from his own workshop rather than producing endless streams of coins. But the main difference seemed to be more of a feeling. As you watched Dad you got pure escapism, perfect entertainment, whilst with uncle Certini there was a different intent. Although he did standard gentleman magic, by his presence, poise and intense presentations each coin that materialized in his empty hands seemed symbolic. Like it was one thing but meant something much more significant.

On rare occasions when I visited uncle Certini he talked about a secret brotherhood of showmen, called the Showman’s Guild. He talked about how the Illuminated Showmen had a different mindset, and different goals to most magicians. This kind of talk didn’t seem so strange to me since I was also part of a secret brotherhood of magicians. I mean the Magic Circle of Norway wasn’t a secret society as such, but it certainly was a society with and about secrets. What made the Guild different was partly my father’s reaction to uncle Certini talking about it. Dad always tried to end the conversation and get onto more practical matters.

Life Death

Uncle Certini had bad nerves I was told. He sometimes had to travel to rest them at a sanatorium in the Fjordlands. Dad later told me that he believed there was a connection between uncle Certini needing to rest his nerves and his preoccupation with the Showmans Guild. I was never so certain.

A product of mental instabilities or over active imagination, this all piqued an interest and a life long research project into first of all trying to establish the reality of this obscure organization, which proves to be most difficult, then puzzle together the tenants of their teachings which they called the Way of the Showman.

Through snippets found, quotations interpreted, reviews found in old news papers and most of all the hand written notes from uncle Certini’s inheritance I’ve got a fair outline of the societiy’s secret history and the goings on in this most singular initiatory Guild.

Lessons from the Way of the Showman – 38

I love it when I’m performing and someone in the crowd loose themselves in the moment. Uncontrollable laughter, childlike gasps, pantomime hands mimicking what they see on stage, or just sheer primal joy and excitement manifested in screaming, whistling, stomping and clapping. When a person no longer worry about anything and is just consumed by the power of the Craft.

In moments like this I see other spectators giving that person envious looks: I whish it was me.

Lessons from the Way of the Showman - 37

 Throughout your shows react to what happens around you. Be there with the Crowd, in the moment. Don’t just go through the motions.
Act without letting decisions pass through the filter of others' opinion. Then begin the work on freeing yourself from your own filters. Few things are more enjoyable to watch than a Showman reacting totally free.

Silent witness sometimes speaks loudest

Charlie Chan at the Circus.

Yes, there is a gorilla in the film...

A murder mystery set at a circus, starring a perfect stereotype of a Chinese American detective. Played by the Swedish actor Warner Oland this portrayal has been the subject of much debate as to whether the role is racist. Some critics can not see past the fine Detective’s broken English and never ending fortune cookie wisdom, like; "facts are like negatives from film, must be exposed before developing," and "not always best to jump on simplest solution, mind like parachute, best when open." Others compare Chang to the Chinese’s portrayal in contemporary films, which at the time were sinister and wicked. This last interpretation was the explicit aim of Earl Derr Briggers which was the creator of the books on which the Charlie Chan movie series was based.

Charlie Chan with Olive and George Brasno.

The film is cute, a real life married short stature couple Olive and George Brasno features quite a bit. Complete with George as a cigar smoking baby, reminiscent of Tod Brownings ‘the Unholy Three.’ As they are introduced in the film we get to see one of their acts, a fantastic dance number.

The film is definitely worth having a look at, and you can do so, for no added fee, right here. Hope you enjoy it.

Lessons from the Way of the Showman - 36

The moments of spontaneity are most like life. No rehearsal only reactions. Once you can create this feeling with your practiced and prepared material you have mastered a very important Lesson.

Beauty is all about patterns

In a very interesting article for wired magazine, Jonah Lehrer suggests that our feelings of beauty are:

“A particularly potent and intense form of curiosity. It’s a learning signal urging us to keep on paying attention, an emotional reminder that there’s something here worth figuring out.”

Salvador Dali, the persistence of time.

He then thinks this peculiar variant of curiosity is hijacked by art. Experiencing beautiful art we get sucked in to the undulating tones of a Beethoven symphony or into Mona Lisa's smile. Great works seems to always imply something, to set up information in patterns that then keeps us waiting for their conclusion. The final line of a Bukowski poem becomes immensely beautiful since it has been so cleverly built up. The feeling of beauty tells us there is a pattern here, and that we have a chance of figuring it out.

“Put another way,” Lehrer says, “beauty is a motivational force that helps modulate conscious awareness. The problem beauty solves is the problem of trying to figure out which sensations are worth making sense of and which ones can be easily ignored.

Great art seems to contain promises of great patterns. The beginning of a symphony sets up a pattern and then the rest, more or less, is a tantalizing “flirtation with – but not submission to – our expectations of order.” 

He quotes some interesting studies that suggests a particular area of the brain, specifically in the medial orbital-frontal cortexinvolved in our experience of beauty, regardless of whether its source is music, painting, weaving, reading or otherwise.

This  is one of the least understood parts of the brain. But what we do know is that it’s instrumental in sensory integration, it regulates how powerful our emotional responses are to stimuli, its also key in decision-making and expectation. In particular, the mOFC is thought to regulate planning behavior associated with sensitivity to reward and punishment. I guess it is then not so unexpected that our experience of beauty resides in this area already known as an important part of our pleasure spectrum.

Auguste Rodin, the Kiss.

“…That brain area has consistently been implicated in the recognition of delightful things, from the taste of an expensive wine to the luxurious touch of cashmere,” explains Lehrer.

As we begin to discover how our experience of beauty originates in the brain we can perhaps answer the philosophical question of what the common quality of Bach, Rodin, Dali, and ancient cave paintings all have in common.

The scientist behind the experiment which localized the beauty responses in the mOFC, “Ishizu and Zeki think that the “peculiar quality” lies not in works of art themselves (pieces of music included), but in the brains of their beholders.”

The objects of art are not so much beautiful in themselves as suggestive of patterns and emotions that stimulates a particular part of the brain. The work of art can in this sense be seen as a trigger for feelings of beauty. And a skilled artist might be said to have an understanding of how to form an object, music or perhaps any type of performance into an experience which triggers beauty trough setting up a pattern and holding off on its completion. Something a little mysterious that cries out to be understood and also gives off the hopeful feeling that you will be able to grasp it.

From the Chauvet caves in France, artist unknown...

In exploring aspects of life as diverse as hallucinatory drugs, meditation, dancing to repetitive music, partaking of religious ceremonies, and studying evolution many of us have had the sense that life and everything is riddled with patterns. I certainly have. Life itself, its origin and development is about order and patterns in seeming chaos. Most early Origin myths are about order from chaos. In fact our minds were made to create meaning from chaos. It is part of what makes us human.

So if beauty is akin to curiosity what exactly is curiosity?

“The first thing the scientists discovered is that curiosity obeys an inverted U-shaped curve, so that we’re most curious when we know a little about a subject (our curiosity has been piqued) but not too much (we’re still uncertain about the answer).”

When there is a gap between what we know and what we want to know we get something like a mental itch and desire to seek knowledge to bridge this gap. This seems to be a fundamental aspect of curiosity.

“The lesson is that our desire for more information – the cause of curiosity – begins as a dopaminergic craving, rooted in the same primal pathway that responds to sex, drugs and rock and roll.”

So the thing that keeps us interested is incompleteness, rather than perfection. A stray hair on a Japanese Zen painting, a gold tooth in a carny’s crooked smile makes something beautiful and interesting.

Researchers in Montreal discovered, through the use of fMRI machines and PET scans that our experience of beauty whilst listening to music is highest fifteen seconds before the climax. As themes, and threads are coming together and the promise of completion looms our experience of beauty is the strongest. We peak emotionally just before the climax.

“It is the suspenseful tension of music (arising out of our unfulfilled expectations) that is the source of the music’s beauty… ‘For the human mind,’ Meyer writes, ‘such states of doubt and confusion are abhorrent. When confronted with them, the mind attempts to resolve them into clarity and certainty.”

Beauty urges us to pay attention to keep looking. It hints at the mysterious, but also gives us hope that understanding is within grasp. It encourages us with its imperfections to want to know more, we want to know how it ends.

“We know just enough to know that we want to know more; there is something here, we just don’t know what. That’s why we call it beautiful.”

x

Perhaps this article can Illuminate aspects of the fundamental structure in our perception of beauty and through it help elevating Showmen’s creation’s as they journey along the Way of the Showman.

Lessons from the Way of the Showman - 35

Be completely committed to the path that you choose,

but be ready to turn off any time to peruse.

 

To be Spontaneous brings the reality of the moment into focus. A moment  of personal freedom for the Showman. The Crowd see you faced with reality, and how you explore it and act accordingly.

the Clown and the New World - part 4

Here it is dear readers, the next and final part of our old Clown's tribulations and explorations of the New world. For those of you that made it all the way through I hope you enjoyed the ride.
If you didn't, read from the beginning here, and follow the links from there.

Part 1 - Tragic beginnings and the Livid Storm
Part 2 - The Carnival is Dead
Part 3 - The Clown and Robert Johnson
Part 4 - The Angel and the Greatest Show on Earth 

Now all aboard the circus train its time to head back into the New World.

8

He wanders on as born anew

ruminating on what’s true.

“What is truly part of me and of my desires?

Do I still retain in me what my work requires?”

The road is long, the country vast

he travels slow and fast.

The road slowly eats his shoes.

He’s almost ready for a snooze

when some papers blow right past.

“It is two circus flyers.”

His heart starts pounding very fast.

And there it is so splendidly

standing in a field.

It’s trains and wagons all around,

a Big Top and Menagerie

so lavishly revealed.

It is the greatest show on earth,

finally, he’ll show his worth.

This is his perfect chance.

So happy is our little clown

He jigs a little dance.

It is the great big circus’ charity matiné,

he hears the proud ringmaster say.

‘Are all the kids from the Orphanage here?’

from the tent, a great big cheer.

‘How ‘bout the kids from the hospital?’

the response, not quite as capital.

Some kids too weak and others broken

but their smiles are their tokens,

they never could have loved it more.

It makes their spirits soar.

‘This is it, this is the day,

now can come whatever may.

No more masks.

The nose is gone.

I never willed

to be the best

I just wanted to be me.

I was stupid not to see

What is done comes not undone.

No longer will I run.

I’ll be doing this for them

For all those who remind me of

my only little love.

He sneaks inside the grand big top

looking like a hobo.

There’s no one there to tell him stop.

As he enters through the canvas flaps

his luck of luck it is

the clown brigade

is on his way to stop a fire’s fizz.

Stupid looking firemen in baggy pants and suits,

other grotesquely smiling clowns

dressed in giant boots,

are stomping on a fire.

Whilst they fall and run around

our hobo clown stands still

with tension and a zeist for life -

his dreams so soon fulfilled.

Then the clowns they notice him.

“Is that hobo clown a bum?”

The Clown Captain runs across

to evict him from the ring

but our hobo clown plays dumb

he doesn’t care about a thing.

Then the crowd all notice him

he goes out on a limb.

As the Clown Captain grabs his neck

our clown he wrestles loose

and gives the Captain’s cheek a peck.

Then he falls down to the ground

in the most surprising manner

he rolls and squirms just like a snake

towards the circus banner.

The children laugh at the funny man.

That makes the other clowns get mad.

‘Who is this guy stealing laughs and joy?

Who makes all the gags we can employ

seem tiresome and old.

Let’s get the intruder out of here.

When we get our funny hands on him

he wont be so bold.

But as they do the best they can

to grab the clumsy man

he falls or drops or spins around

to the music of the band.

His tricks miraculously saves him

from the fury of the clowns.

Which makes them chase him harder,

sawdust flying from the grounds.

The Ringmaster did shout:

“Who is this guy I want him out

he is ruining the show.”

The mighty swarm of clowns

is closing on our funny man,

his chances they look slim,

but it doesn’t seem to bother him.

He jumps inside the centre ring

where the tiger cage is set.

He runs inside and quickly stops,

kicking sawdust and some bottle tops,

then all the clowns gets in the cage

with sinister looking props.

But just before they jump on him

comes the most surprising stunt.

He jumps out through safety gap,

so tight it makes him grunt.

And snaps the lock down shut.

Then he stands alone.

The only in the ring.

For a moment there he thinks

he hears the angels sing.

He is the only one not in a cage.

The clowns all are looking

like lions in their rage.

The thunderous applause

and the loud appreciation,

so powerful that it shook

the entire nation

The ringmaster says:

“Who is this guy?

I need to know

I want him in the show.”

Everyone inside the tent,

there is more than

ten thousand

stands up in their ovation.

Which is quite unusual

for a clowns creation.

“I have never witnessed this

and I have been around,”

said the stirred Ringmaster,

he was breathing ever faster.

“He doesn’t wear a painted face.

No red nose sits in place.

It’s just a man.

The applause it has become so wild

it’s drowning out the band.”

All the crowd is clapping

Except one little girl.

Warily the girl stands up

and strokes away a curl

Eyes locked at the hobo

She walkes out in the ring.

For the first in the longest time

the old clown is happy.

Forgotten is the strife and grime.

He’s feeling rather sappy.

Then he sees the little girl

and her long blond hair.

Like an angel, she’s so fair.

She looks just like his little girl.

So beautiful she can’t be

of this retched world.

The crowd’s noise,

so loud it makes him dizzy.

His little brain is way too busy.

‘It cannot be.

Was I not free?

Why come this apparition now to me?’

His heart is pounding in his chest

Almost bursting from his breast.

‘Now, I am possessed.’

He holds on to his breaking heart.

‘This is it.

She has come to take me home.

My heart has broken.

Thank you lord for letting me

make them laugh again.

Smiles abound so nice to see.

Just one more time before I died.

Thank you and amen.’

He holds his arms out to the side

towards his angle girl

Now let us fly. Take us home

up through the circus dome.

Let eternity unfurl.

If my mind is playing tricks on me,

if this all is a dream,

then dear God let me please

just sleep and sleep and sleep.

His eyes are now so filled with tears.

He he can not see her face

The girl holds out her hands

into empty space.

And the crowd quiets down a bit

Some in the front now sit.

His tears makes him strain his eyes

makes the spotlights shine like stars.

Then he sees the necklace

on her neck so slight.

It fills him fast as fright:

A picture of that night.

The Necklace that he knows so well,

the ship of holy writ.

The very recreation.

The very Noah’s ark

he gave to her before the swell

ate her like a shark.

Now she comes on over

and whispers out his name.

And after that our old clown

never was the same.

The old man buckles and falls down to his knees

She puts her arms around her dad.

‘Please now father don’t be sad

You promised me: ‘it won’t be bad.’

And now I know its true.

I have so much to tell to you

I clung so long to the broken mast

But please now father

hold me fast

and never let me go.

They said that you would never come

but I always told them no.’

The father cried and cried and cried

He couldn’t make it stop.

No matter how he tried

He flung his arms around his girl.

‘My precious little pearl.

The miracle of miracles,

It finally came through.

Standing real before me now

it is really you.

It really is my gorgeous dove

my only little love.’

x

Thank to all those of you who found time for the full experience.

Yours truly

Captain Frodo

Saved by Sideshow - Rasmus Nielsen

A Carny Hero

On 8^th of July, 1946, two days after the worst circus catastrophe in recorded history, the Hartford circus fire, a local paper called the Hartford Tribune, ran the headline reading:

SAVED BY SIDESHOW FREAK

Underneath was a picture of a short stout woman with a young boy of about six, both holding up their unused tickets to the fateful matinee-show where 169 patrons of the Greatest show on Earth was burnt to death.

‘I had bought tickets to the circus and took Frankie Jr down early so he could experience the midway.’ Frieda was quoted as saying.

At one of the Sideshow stages they stopped to watch the ballyhoo presentation of the sensational Scandinavian muscle man Rasmus Nielsen. I have had an interest in this unique sideshow performer for some time so reading this article thrilled me, to the point of creating a routine as an homage to him  back in 2003, but I digress. This veteran showman with the Ringling Brothers Sideshow was no ordinary strongman. His body was covered crown to heal in tattoos. Two fat steel rings pierced his nipples, like bones through a savage nose. His feat of strength and endurance consisted of clamping his nipple and chest flesh between two metal bars attached to a chain wrapped around an anvil! The wing nut screws tightened around his flesh hard enough to allow him to lift the 250 pound blacksmith tool off the ground. As he struggled he let out a stream of offensive guttural sounds.

‘To transcend the pain,’ the sideshow talker had explained. His noises and screams invigorated the crowd but, according to the article, it scared Frieda’s boy witless.

‘I was mesmerized by this barbaric performance, when Frankie Jr. tugged at my skirt. Looking at him I saw horror in his eyes. I got no idea what scared him so much but he was terrified and no amount of mollycoddling was going to stop it. Actually it just got worse and worse, until he screamed louder than the strongman himself. It was embarrassing, so I grabbed his arm and we left.’ Frieda said.

Her boy was so gripped by fright removing him from the strongman’s display didn’t calm him. His piercing screams, like “from a beaten dog,” became an ominous augury of the looming arson havoc.

The Gentle Strongman

After about half an hour of fruitless coercion with everything from treats to threats Frieda took little Frank home, hoping to be able to use her unused tickets for the evenings performance.

‘It gives me goose bumps to think about. Now I just want to thank Rasmus Nielson, the Scandinavian Strongman for saving our lives.’ Frieda finished.

The Clown and the New World - Part 3

How deep does the jester sink? All the way to Hell?

We are back again with our wandering, wondering, clown serching for the Way.
It is adviced that you read part one and two before you read this.

Part 1 - Tragic beginnings and the Livid Storm
Part 2 - The Carnival is Dead
Part 3 - The Clown and Robert Johnson
Part 4 - The Angel and the Greatest Show on Earth 


Relax your mind for it is time to journey back to the New World.


 

5

He’s stranded now without a job

in a one horse town.

He takes a stroll to look around.

then sets his course for the only bar

to swamp his feelings with a drink.

Anything to stop him think.

But as he nears the door he hears

sweet sounds from a guitar.

He’s never heard such sounds before.

It grabs his hurting heart and tear

and tear and tear, but not apart,

rather piercing like a dart.

Picking strings

while he sings

it sounds as sweet as art.

Like the very hand of God

had sprouted from a man,

for only the divine it can

turn soul straight into sound

as coarse and harsh and primitive

as from this coloured fellow,

that sits in the darkened corner

Looking  rather mellow.

Strumming, picking, plucking

the soul from his guitar.

The guitarist was hardly old enough

to be called a man.

“He’s but a boy how can it be?

I need to know how it began.

Can there be enough inside of him

of life both sweet and grim?

Heaven, earth and all between

from the time before the very day

when God him self would say:

let there be time and space and life

and death and all between

and all the way until it ends

in eternity.

How comes it that this young man can

so easily convey

all this just through his play”

When the music stops

the jester goes

over with a drink.

‘Those sounds

they sure are sweet.

They really make me think,

that never in my time I’ve heard

their like before, my friend.

The lacerations through my soul that loss

of love from life it tore,

your music seems to mend.’

“I’m glad it makes you feel like this.

For the price to play so sweet a tune

was my soul to the abyss

on Beelzebub’s harpoon.

Satan showed me how to croon

and play this old guitar

He promised me I’d be a star.

But in return I had to give

The Evil One control

Of my immortal soul.”

The Merrier he drank his drink

And gave it all a good old think.

“I’ll ask the devil to make of me

the funniest man on earth.

Make my mother the only one

to ever have given birth

to such a man of mirth.

I see no further down from here

so tell me, if you can,

where can I meet this devil man?

I’d like of him to make it so

each time I do a show

I’m always met with laughter

never met with frowns.

I want him to make of me

the ultimate King of clowns.

‘You must be sure

that’s what you want.

For the price you’ll have to pay

is that you must sign away

your own immortal soul.’

“Oh I don’t care about my look

my empty gut or smell.

I have hurt too much to care

I now want to excel.”

But in his heart he hoped

that he would to find a way

to keep Beelzebub at bay.

‘Well,

then I’ll tell you all you need,

all you need to know.

You have to get a crucifix

one that’s made of birch.

I know there is just such a cross

You can steal from that little church.

Then go to the crossroads

on the other side of town.

Just past the hallowed ground

where the gallows tree

stands black and dead.

You have to remember what I said

Nothin’ will work instead.

Then place your hands around the cross

so it is upside down.

You got to stick it in the ground

so the Lord’s whole head is in.

If you put it right way round, you see,

your luck’ll be runnin’ thin.

You must be sure his head is Buried,

burried in the dirt.

This is a fact I must assert

the Lord

must be made inert.

His ears must be covered

so he can’t hear.

His eyes must be blind

so he can’t see.

You’ll have to spit,

you’ll have to swear.

and carve a skull

and dead-man’s bones

deep into a tree.

Then you got to be waitin’,

the Devil don’t come right away.

When he comes, you got to pray

you know just what to say.

The Devil wont be waitin’

for you to make up your mind.

If you meet him

with your mind unmade

the Devil don’t care to be kind.”

6

The Clown gets a wooden cross and

plants it upside down,

in the centre of the crossing roads

the call to hell is sown.

The Armenian merry-man

stood waiting in the sun.

He put his round, red clown nose on

transformation had begun.

The fool inside crept out from sleep,

funny enough to make grown men weep.

But the hours came and went away,

it is hard to clown around all day.

He reached into his jacket lining

and fished out a flask of rum.

It didn’t even touch his mind

That to drink might just be dumb.

Don’t dance with the Devil drunk, they say,

you just won’t get your way.

He’ll say he’ll fix your every need

As long as he gets to lead.

Shuffling ‘round in the wilted grass

He spotted a thing that shone like brass

In the yellow straw by the dusty road,

a little lantern gone astray

had become the castle for a toad.

And he fell on his face to pray.

Then he shook the cane toad king

from the throne where he tried to cling.

To find a little light

to illuminate the dark

was just what he did need.

If the devil came upon him

after the sun‘d gone down.

He was sure a simple clown

would in the darkness drown.

Unless there was a way he could

create a little spark

and with it plant a burning seed.

It is best to see your steps

if the devil’s in the lead.

The hours ticked past

with lead-footed pace

Soon the scare crow suited clown sat

staring into space.

Far away he saw some sheep

And before long he fell asleep.

7

He wakes up to the sound of steps

coming up the road.

His heart it hammers,

his breath is short

and long gone is his toad.

There’s no fire in his lantern

But he holds it non-the less.

He checks his round red nose is straight,

that the crucifix is desecrate.

He is ready to transgress.

The sound of steps from hobnail boots

on the feet of a Hobo man.

“The times they must be hard

he thought,

when the Devil walks the land.

Are you the one called Beelzebub

who comes out from the dark?”

The hobo laughed and said he was

called by many names,

but Beelzebub was stark.

‘Well, then Devil, I’ll ask you this:

Can you make of me the king of fools?

The funniest of every man

who don’t have to follow rules.’

The Hobo he stood quiet now,

they felt the warm wind blow,

the hobo’s eyes was staring at

the red nose of a clown.

‘You don’t look like you are bound

by rules and regulations.

No, to me it seems you should

perform at celebrations.’

“That’s exactly what I want.

I want to be the best.

The one that’s so uproarious

he’s different from the rest.”

 “Well, if you’re sure you think that’s true

that all of that is truly you,

that’s just what you should do.”

“If you’ll do me this

I’ll give to you my immortal soul.

I assume that’s what you want.

The hobo looked bewildered now

and stood there like a cow.

‘I thought you asked just in jest

to get something of your chest.

But actually you think I am the evil king of pest.

I tell you clown:

I am not different from the rest.

And my advice to you is this

If you harbor such desires,

to really be a king

or any kind of fool

I believe just as a rule,

you must do it for yourself.

There will be no help from Lucifer

or God on heavens shelf.

If your desire lies in art

just listen to your heart.

If deep in there, you know you want

to be an idiot savant

That fills good folks with laugh and joy

Bring happiness to girl and boy,

You must listen to yourself

With your heart as a compass on your way

you will never go astray.’

With this the Hobo walked away

down the dusty road

with no delay.

The jester stood alone

to kick the dust and groan.

He hadn’t dared to look inside

deep inside himself,

for there he knew what would reside.

A hole so deep and black and dark

It would eat him like a shark.

With this inside it wasn’t strange

That people didn’t laugh.

The sorrow grown from loosing her

wrecked his fate in all mankind.

It tore his heart and soul and mind

Until his art was so confined

It spoke to none,

not even him.

‘So long my only want has been,

I want her back.

This has been my nightly plea,

my poor minds only track.

Why did you take her from me Lord?

Why did you not take me?

How many nights’ been spent like these

With grief devouring me like disease,

my heart refusing to let it go

the image of her drowned below.

If I am to stay around

on this retched earth

I must make my life have worth.

I must release her from my heart and mind

To let what’s happened be behind

and let my soul appease.

The Merrier stood abruptly up

And grabbed the crucifix.

‘I’m hanging up this call to hell

I no longer wish to sell

my very soul for tricks.’

Then in the dark he took the cross

and dug a little grave.

To come to terms with loss

and her that he still crave

he decides that he must bury

the only thing that’s left from home.

He dropped the old red clowny nose

into the little grave

the carefully covered it with moss

then threw away the cross.

x

The end of the day is nothing but a new beginning. Our clown has begun anew standing naked in a new world.  As your friend, let me tell you the conclusion to the epic tale will be all that you could hope. The final chapter is upon us, check it out, you owe it to yourself to discover how it ends in part four. 

Yours truly

Captain Frodo