• The circus moved into town last week, acrobats, elephants, peanuts, the dreaded clown with his little car. And I thought, finally, something tangible, a performance unmasked and well rehearsed. I checked my ticket, in disbelief, for it read: Monday, 7:00 P.M., The Flying Lords of Prime Time. 7:00 P.M., what a mistake.
    Ah, the smell of the circus. It wafted out of the tents giant mouth, the warm fragrance of pop corn and peanuts mixed with the shocking perfume of animals. And then I saw the tent, a giant candy cane that bore the tatters of a hundred thousand miles. It was magnificent, so full of innocence and smiles but bearing the marks of age and wisdom. How sad that it was all coming to an end. My worst fears were realized as I entered the structure. I was the only member of the audience, all the rest were glued to their couches at home. The prime time was too precious to waste on hardcore, white make-up clowns. No, they had to have their electric masked performers.
    When the show closed it was a relief. Even the animals seemed depressed through the performance. The elephant pranced around in circles that seemed meaningless with only one observer. A clown cried out, saying the tiger's captivity was a waste and tried to free him into the night. I couldn't tell if they stopped him, everyone was moving so languidly. While they compressed the ancient tent into vinyl sheets, sad workers fell into fits, others just stood stoically, used to the disregard. Just one ticket couldn't move the sincerest painted mask into a smile.
    I found myself at home later. My eyelids, closed, felt like little corks, tightly fitted to champagne bottles, ready to be freed of pressure from the constant shaking. As they busted open, they squirted alcohol into the static forge, the artist responsible for the clown frowns that scarred my perception forever.
    It was obscene, this flat, shocking face that stared into my eyes, apathetic of anything that didn't live inside its little world, its narcissistic gutter. A face of moving wax, a perfect copy of nothing, set inside a furnace. It melted, running into itself, pouring out onto me, dripping its sagging skin onto every floor it could rest its feet on; for what purpose?
    How do you think this happened? This new-Rome, this great caramel based world. A world where circus children go hungry, their parents pockets empty of love and money. One in which candle-face rides the legislator's shoulders while the vagabond watches from the greasy bus window in despair, suffocating on nothing. What happened to his air? The giant candle-face drunk it all in.
    Chopped every little piece of oxygen into tiny bits, sucked it down, and expelled its supper in front of everyone, right onto its face. Its glowing, worshiped, vomit covered face. And then what do we do, this new age, this pinnacle of man? Lick every last bit off, and show our food to everyone we meet. Every random
    stranger's cochlea is massaged by the people's most flamboyant expressions, all fixated on describing waxy bile. All of it running from the waxy wound, producing red, green, and blue blood streaks, in perfect little patterns to delight the eye, and melt the brain.
    Or maybe I'm being too harsh. Television isn't always poisonous; it has its good days. Why should we care about the homeless when we can force all of the old people and tear stained clowns to upgrade to digital? No, nothings wrong with T.V. at all.