The Clown and the New World - Epic poem by Captain Frodo

1

In the faraway land of Hayastan,

unfamiliar to the unschooled man,

beneath the mountain that once was

the port for Noah’s Ark,

lived a man that made a life as

a clown, in a circus park.

But there were no laughs in his caravan,

Life was hard for this poor man,

awaiting Death to take his wife,

one of two loves in his life.

Filled with grief the clown he saw

his wife wasting away,

but knew that there had to be

meaning in all dismay.

The horrid symptoms of consumption

was God’s will, was his assumption.

His other love, his little girl,

became motherless in this world.

The Clown took he the death to mean

it had been time for change.

He thought the best would be to board

a boat to somewhere strange.

His landlocked homeland had no shores 

he had to journey for a ship.

He packed his case and then prepared

his daughter for the trip.

He couldn’t wander west,

through Anatolia.

For there they slew his country men,

he would go through Georgia.

He traveled long and he traveled far

Out to the dark Black Sea.

He boarded a vessel that would sail

To the New World filled with glee.

They sailed through the Bosperus strait

Where he thaught his girl to fasten bait.

They stopped a day on the isle of Malta

then journeyed past the rock of Gibraltar.

They’d sailed far out on the open sea,

no land had been in sight,

when a livid storm hit their ship

in the dead of night.

2

The wind it roars and the sails they crack

as the ship is going down.

He protects his girl from the waves’ attack.

“I will not let you drown.”

But the sea is strong and it’s liquid arms

they are so full of force.

The drowning clown is willful, but weak.

You can never keep back anything

the ocean wants, of course,

but the father refuses to give up,

though life is bleak.

They draw their breath

and pray that they wont die

as the tired father treads the sea

and tries to hold her high.

He tells her

“It will all be good,”

but he knows it is a lie.

His legs they burn in the icy sea,

the painful fear and agony

tears at the poor clowns soul.

He’s clinging to his faith of old

“Please save me lord above,

take me please, and let her live,

my only little love.”

Nothing changes

God does not appear to hear.

“Why would God tear my child from me?

take innocent life away at whim?”

He spits, and burps and chokes, and coughs, 

barely managing to swim.

He knows that the Almighty’s plan

is inscrutable to man.

There is no way a mortal can

even start to understand.

But he knows his own girls’ heart is pure,

she’s a beaming innocent.

“Please My Lord don’t drown her dead

I promise I’ll repent.

I’ll stop this silly life of mine

the constant sheer frivolity.

Please God, I beg you Lord

let her escape mortality

So many of your church men said

That only sin and devils work

With circus and laughs is spread

I thought them wrong, I couldn’t see

That you were only testing me

to not trust my own head.

A little child so young and weak,

how could you in your wisdom seek

such havoc for the meek.”

He needs a rest so desperately

but the storm is blowing ceaselessly.

With his girl’s arms around his neck

Like an anchor from a ship,

She shouts into his dripping ear

with diction like a whip

“Please strong father hold me fast.

I can not even see the mast!

How can we sail to the New World

without even a boat?”

He smiles to calm his little girl

Whilst struggling to float.

With his last remaining strength

He takes his necklace of his head

It has always kept him safe

And promised hope ahead

Now he wants his girl to have

all his hope instead.

It sparkles as the lightening flash

and shortly lights the dark.

It is a golden recreation

of Noah’s Ark.

And how it hurts his soul to see

this symbol of a boat

That saved each living thing

by keeping them afloat.

He prays again to his Lord God

“Please send an Ark for me,

I can not hold her anymore

please end this misery.”

But nothing comes

and the storm it blows,

blows on, and on, and on.

His legs are lame

and he knows,

that the sea has won.

As the father cries tears of blood

and trembles with fatigue

The ocean waves comes crashing in

and finally end the siege.

It grabs them both

and tear and tear,

and tear and tear apart.

No stronger love was fought unbound

in ocean or on solid ground.

So finally the moment comes

when he no longer can hold on

As she slips out of his grip

he sees her as a swan.

The clown he isn’t strong enough

to hold his little girl.

Their fingers part, she’s drifting off

he thinks he hears her cough.

In his mind his cygnet love

swims on to a better place

it brakes his heart to look upon

her little drowning face.

“Why do you deem it time,” he screams,

but God does not retort

All his strife has come to naught

Little hope remains for him,

it all seems rather grim.

He wishes to go to God as well,

so he doesn’t swim.

3

To his surprise he woke alive

in a narrow berth.

It felt like someone stabbed his heart

now he had no worth,

as in a flash it came to him:

She had left this earth.

Beside him sat a sailor

he'd fallen deep asleep.

The clown turned against the wall

to weep and weep and weep.
The ship was full of sailors
harpuners and whalers.

As they fished him from the sea

they found the clown's red nose.

There were mumbles and commotion,

“only clowns wears one of those.”

And the men proposed in jest

the man he was a clown.

But, when asked if it was so,

he would only frown.

Then one day the ship it docked 

in the tiniest of ports.

The half dead fool, he left ship,

dressed finely up, of sorts.

he headed straight for town

in nothing but a gown.

He had no place to be or go

but walking numbed the pain.
No thing to do, no folks to meet
he swirled into a drain.
His mind could fly so far away 

and he could be relieved.

The walking it was good for him,

that was what he believed.

But he was almost naked

so far away from home,

he would need some clothes and shoes,

if he was to roam.

In a corn crop, by the little port

He saw a scarecrow standing,

waving in the gentle wind

with night dark ravens landing

on his outstretched arms,

in a field between two farms.

A scarecrow not repulsing birds

is absolutely obsolete.

With easy heart the jester could

the scarecrows clothes deplete.

4

The stranger in a strange new land

thought that he would drown

in all the tears that fell from him,

the broken hearted clown.

There was no joy in his heart no-more

Without the daughter he adored

He only wished to be ignored.

But somewhere deep inside there were

a spark that would deter,

the harrowed soul from finding death.

It stopped him seeking his last breath.

Even with a broken heart

a man must eat and drink.

But it’s so hard to make folks laugh

when of only misery you think.

And soon his belly rumbled

even louder than his heart

and he knew the time had come

for his display’s of mirth to start.

In the Scarecrow’s suit

he made up his mind.

“I’ll present my act on the seaport square.

From the look of all these sour-faced men

a show like this, is rare round here.”

He found a spot he thought would work,

wiped away a little tear.

He begun his old routines from home

but found the acts fell flat.

As he did his best to make them laugh,

they all shunned him like a rat.

Moments meant for laughter

were ominously silent

other moments meant for joy,

on the brink of being violent.

By the culmination of his act

the audience had left

the ancient, lonely harlequin

was quite alone in fact.

To stop his hunger,

he stole a bread

and ate it in the grave yard,

surrounded by the dead.

And so it went for many months

the clown became a thief.

To avoid the law his stays in towns

they all became quite brief.

On feet or in a railroad cart

always further south.

Tormented by his drowning girl

consumed by Neptune’s mouth.

The dust it blew right through him

as he walked the wind swept land

not enough of food to eat

neither fresh nor canned.

He was heading straight into a drought.

On his long and lonesome way,

way, way, way down south,

Then one day as the clown

walked into a town

there was a circus in the square.

A tiny little horse drawn show

with a Strongman and a bear.

The half starved and thirsty clown,

walked up like he belonged.

He tried to tell the circus men

he was a clown from far away

who had by life been wronged.

The strong man laughed and told him

straight up to his face

“You, a clown, I doubt that’s true.

You look like a disgrace.”

The jester he would not give up

He wanted bad to be on show

on a stage, in a big top.

But they did not want to hire him

as a funny man.

They didn’t think he’d have a plan

to make crowds laugh until they’d weep.

Instead they saw the poor old man

as a homeless creep.

But finally he got a job

as a low paid geek.

He got his board

and two bucks per week.

So the clown that lost his luck

now made a living eating snakes.

He found he didn’t mind

If he imagined they were steaks.

They traveled in the horse drawn carts,

from town to town,

but every village, just as bad

there just weren’t no cash around.

The shows were empty

but the fairground full

of people looking in.

The children looked so awfully thin.

Trying to get a man to gamble

a game, he couldn’t win

was crime as dark as sin.

When people starve

then no one wants

see the Wildman eat a snake.

With enough days without a bite

you have such a belly-ache,

seeing a man in a pit

bite the head right of a snake

does not repulse a bit.

Then after many weeks of this

they arrived into a town

Every river had run dry,

with deep cracks in the ground.

There had been no rain for months,

perhaps even for years.

The sound of crying, thirsty babes

filled their dusty ears.

Just before the show should start

the promoter called them ‘round,

famous for his armored heart,

he told them that the world they knew

had begun to fall apart.

The fat promoter climbed atop

the wagon filled with poles.

He raised his hands and cleared his throat

to the parched cries of a dancing goat.

“There is no money in any town

neither here nor there,

all the water has turned brown,

we are miles from anywhere.”

His eyebrows furrowed as he said

“We are sorry to have to tell you this

but the Carnival is Dead.”

He took his hat so solemnly

of his sweaty head

and placed it right before his heart

as an example for the crew,

but his face, a tad to smug,

the Strongman yelled

“screw you”

But there were no doubt in any mind

That the fairground did unwind.

And the carnival disbanded when

the management ran off

there were many hefty quarrels

and plenty fight and scoff

before they all went separately

out in the world, all free.

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.

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