WEBVTT

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This is a poem
called "The Circus."

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I get called a lot by
charities on the phone--

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maybe that happens here, too--

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wanting contributions to things.

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And sometimes I'd give and
sometimes I don't, but usually

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they're not really
absolutely truthful

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about what this charity is for.

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If I were on the
phone calling people,

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this is what I
would want to say.

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Called "The Circus."

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"If you've done things you
should still feel sorry for,

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then sending your check
to the Shriners Circus

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Fund for Crippled Children
won't make you feel good

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anymore than it's made
the wife beater feel

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good, or the loan shark, or
the bookkeeper at the missile

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plant.

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Send it simply as they do,
to sponsor a little joy.

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Then if you sit in
the crowd, you'll

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wonder if the crippled
children should

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be laughing with
the healthy ones,

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or shaking their fists at the
roof instead with Job's wife,

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refusing to adjust
to what they'd never

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have to adjust to in a world
carefully planned and made.

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From your seat in
back, something

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will look so wrong
it will dawn on you

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why the maker was afraid
when Adam and Eve ate

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from the tree of knowledge--

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afraid they'd notice his
slipshod craftsmanship.

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It won't surprise you then
that many aspire to leave.

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That the ladder
that Plato climbed

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led him away from
the visible kingdom

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to a beauty that didn't
exist and never would,

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that wasn't responsible
for the pitiful imitations.

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No wonder the couple
on the high trapeze

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delights the children so much,
flouting the cloddish law

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of gravity, trying to be birds.

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And then the army of
clowns climbing out

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of the car that by any law
of matter couldn't hold four.

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And still they come,
another and another,

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while those in the
crowd who can't jump up

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strain forward in their
seats to cheer them on."

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Do you have a Kleenex?

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No.

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No!

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Everything else.

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All right.

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I have a clean handkerchief.

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No, I can't use a handkerchief.

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[LAUGHTER]

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Right here.

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I'll use this.

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No, no, no.

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[INTERPOSING VOICES]

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Oh, nothing.

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This never happens to me.

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I don't know what it is.

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I think I may be
allergic to something

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growing in the desert.

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Here are some.

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