The Laughmaker

The laughing, laughing of the crowd
slices like a knife
into the very soul of me.
They are laughing at my antics,
But yet, I think they laugh
only at me.

O the life of a sorry clown.
Born and made to be the butt
of all the slapstick pranks.
Made not to laugh, but to be laughed at
given the Devil's gift of humor;
given Emett Kelly as his god;
given happiness as his goal--
something he cannot have for himself,
but must give to the candy-coated children
and their aloof parents.

Whatever I do, they laugh.
And their laughing, laughing, laughing
slides between my ribs and twists and turns
and severs the delicate strings that hold
my heart--
taking one, then two, then all--
And my heart falls to the bottom of my
undernourished stomach and shatters--
with each performance. . . each show.

Every time I walk into the ring
they laugh.
Every time I get hit with a
slapstick and fall and roll in the
sawdust they laugh.
The coarse little bits of wood that work
their way into my shirt and down my back
and fall out of my pant legs
make them laugh even so much
harder.

They laugh and are happy
I stand with my sorry, painted face--
Sorry because it is painted on me.
Sorry  because the tears in my eyes
are real--
teats that run down my face in
muddy torrents
picking up bits of dirty grease-paint
that outline the creases in my face--
real creases--
not just painted on.

The people don't see these though.
The candy-coated children and their
laughing, hacking parents don't see the
little muddy drops on my patchwork jacket.
They're too far away; they're up in the stands
laughing, laughing--laughing at me.

At the end of the show I go to my
dressing room.
I take off my patchwork jacket
and baggy pants and oversize shoes
and sit in front of a mirror--
a clown's mirror--and wipe away the
painted, sad face.

But not all of the paint comes off.
The inner paint--the paint that causes
the wrinkles in my brow--
the paint that makes my mouth turn down
at the corners
and my eyes dark and sad--
Won't come off.
This is the paint of life.

This is the paint caused by being the
butt of all the jokes and having
sawdust ground into my skin;
from the searing; cutting wounds of
causing laughing, laughing, laughing,
when I am not able to laugh.

by James I. Morgan

Published in Convolutions
Peoria, IL; Bradley University
Winter 1960-61

pp. 7&8