"barnum" poems
The posters said tomorrow
At eleven on the dot
The Mishkin Brothers Circus
Would be here ....on this spot
There would be no carnival or midway
Just one tent and three rings
And all of the excitement
That a good old circus brings
There would be elephants and lions
Trapeze artists overhead
Dancing dogs and ponies
And zebras painted red
Clowns of all description
Answering to just one man
In the center of the circle
Was Mishkin brother....Dan
He'd run the show for twenty years
Gone from town to town to town
In one day they would get set up
And in two, they'd tear it down
One day to show the locals
The circus still was an event
With magic, form the Barnum Days
All housed inside one tent
The sideshow barkers and their geeks
Were not with this fine group
Dan Mishkin had assembled
Only the finest circus troup
From Russia he had jugglers
Knife throwers, just the best
******** riders from Decatur
Along with all the rest
Fourteen trucks and trailers
Pulled into town the night before
Breaking ground once they arrived
Working right through until four
Just old time entertainment
No travelling gypsy band was this
It was the Mishkin Brothers Circus
It was something not to miss
The show was started promptly
At twelve o'clock, like the sign said
A parade of all the players
And the zebras painted red
Two shows and it was over
The whole routine began anew
The field was once more empty
Gone was the Mishkin rolling zoo
A year from now, we'd see the signs
And we'd all go to the tent
To see the Mishkin Brothers Circus
The best money ever spent
Jun 13, 2015
Jun 13, 2015 at 4:48 PM UTC
Georgiana Seymour,
Duchess of Somerset
crowned _'Queen of Beauty'_
at the 1839 Eglinton
Tournament, the first known
beauty pageant;
W
European festivals dating to the medieval era
provide the most direct lineage for beauty pageants.
For example, English May Day celebrations always
involved the selection of a May Queen.
In the United States, the May Day tradition
of selecting a woman to serve as a symbol
of bounty and community ideals continued,
as young beautiful women participated
in public celebrations; such as the beauty pageant
held during the Eglinton Tournament of 1839,
organized by Archibald Montgomerie, 13th Earl of Eglinton,
as part of a re-enactment of a medieval joust
that was held in Scotland; the pageant was won
by Georgiana Seymour, Duchess of Somerset,
wife of Edward Seymour, 12th Duke of Somerset,
and sister of Caroline Norton;
Georgiana proclaimed _"Queen of Beauty"_;
Entrepreneur Phineas Taylor Barnum staged
the first modern American pageant in 1854,
his beauty contest closed down after public protest;
However beauty contests became popular
in the 1880s; In 1888 the title of _'beauty queen'_
was awarded to an 18-year-old Creole contestant
at a pageant in Spa, Belgium. All participants
had to supply a photograph & a short description
of themselves to be eligible to enter; a final selection
of 21 judged by a formal panel.
Such events were not regarded as respectable;
But beauty contests came to be considered more
respectable with the first modern _"Miss America"_
contest held in 1921;
Still the oldest pageant in operation,
the Miss America pageant was organized
in 1921 by a local businessman as a means
to entice tourists to Atlantic City, New Jersey;
The pageant hosted the winners of local
newspaper beauty contests in the
_Inter-City Beauty Contest_ & was attended
by over one hundred thousand people;
_Sixteen-year-old Margaret Gorman of Washington, D.C.
was crowned Miss America 1921, having won both the
popularity and beauty contests, and was awarded $100_
Sep 1, 2018
Sep 1, 2018 at 10:04 AM UTC
It was, as the New York Times all but sniffed
(Even then, a haughty mix of bluenose and black ink)
Further proof the poor, misguided Upstate rubes
Were no more than ample fodder
For any tinhorn, two-bit confidence man to take for a ride.
Fair enough—it was, to the careful eye and unheated psyche
Clear as the azure blue sky that,
Despite the best efforts of acid wash and a year underground,
So obviously a statue as to be absolutely laughable,
And yet the vox populi came in waves,
Not only one-gallus farmers from the fields nearby,
But from the great cities near and far
(Chicago, Philadelphia, and, yes, even New York itself
To throw Hannum a quarter to view his gargantuan grotesquery
Just as described in Genesis itself, he noted solemnly
So many, indeed, that Barnum himself was divinely inspired
Not only to purloin the giant, but its prior owner’s epigram
As to the frequency of the manufacture
Of his too-credible customer base.
While there was (briefly, at least) some mystery surrounding
The origins of the brobdingnagian mass of stone,
It remained (to some, anyway) equally unfathomable
Why scores of folks would careen in unsteady coaches
The full length of the Catskill Turnpike,
With its questionable lodging and uneven roadworthiness,
Or patiently suffer the mosquito-laden flatboats of Clinton’s Ditch
All to spend the cash equivalent of two trips to the county fair
To see a perfectly good hootchie-kootchie show
Simply to gawk at an unevenly carved rock of questionable authenticity,
But that explained quite simply,
As the public always gets what the public wants.
Aug 3, 2018
Aug 3, 2018 at 4:03 PM UTC
Your love was like the Barnum Effect
and though I thought you fit me
like a glove,
I learned you'd been worn
by thousands of other lovers
who'd thought the same exact thing.
Nov 20, 2015
Nov 20, 2015 at 2:41 AM UTC
Where did the circus go?
Not like the Del Mar fair
Or the Barnum and Bailey skinny cow version
I want someplace nasty
A bit sticky
Someplace that picks up and leaves
before you have time to go get your watch back
All that’s left is a lot
Full of trash and ride screws
Because the rush to leave was more important
than safety
It’s a place most days now
I wish I could run away to
Slap on fake **** and be the bearded lady
Or warts and green paint and be frog man
Be something along the lines of
Homemade make believe
Be happy believing that
This other place doesn’t have things
Like rent
And car payments
And work that ***** you harder than your own girlfriend will
And don’t tell me cirque de solei is hiring
That’s not a circus
That’s people in costumes dancing and flying around on stages
They had to go to school to do that
You don’t need school to join the circus
You just need the desire to leave
Before anyone notices you’re gone
Maybe leave behind a sticky mess
And take with you something valuable
Like a watch
Or money from the purse on the counter
Or someone’s heart
Maybe I could be tattoo man
Or the ***** Mouthed Poet
And freestyle psalms that ache behind a glass window
That you have to pay a quarter to see through
And another quarter to listen
Or I could be a wax statue of Jesus
The one that if you stare at long enough
You see him breathing
Enough to restore faith in the make believe
That keeps us going
Let me be your side show
Let me be your fortune teller
Let me be the dark room in that back
Only the men are allowed into
Women and children this way
Let me be the ***** talk of town
And leave before the lynching
Let me leave in the night like a piper
With the promise
That I will give you the life you’ve always wanted
If you leave behind all you’ve ever been
Remember him?
He joined the circus?
Where’d the circus go?
Jun 14, 2012
Jun 14, 2012 at 5:54 PM UTC
* “There’s always a sucker in the till. . .and an investor in the mill.” *
Jun 6, 2016
Jun 6, 2016 at 11:47 PM UTC
The begging God
Holds forth His greedy hands
Palms up
Lifeline unbroken
A vending machine
Without a coin slot
Asks for a dime
Expects a dollar
A greedy deity
Who dances with demons
Listens to gibberish
Suffers fools gladly
Insisting
"This is the Way, the Truth, the Life
This is the way it's done, it's all you must do
This the truth: P.T. Barnum was right
This is the life, unearned and unpaid for
A wise investor's goldmine
A field of dreams for sale, barren
Blood money for more seed
It's yours for the asking"
The begging God
Patron saint of confidence and extortion
Comforts the elderly
Patiently waiting
For
The Big Payoff
For
It's easy to convince them
To expect a windfall
Green Granny Smith apples
On sale
Ten for a dollar
Tiny serpent worms munch tunnels
In nine of them
The gambling deity
Lays odds on whether or not
Their shiny skins will ever be broken
By coffee stained teeth or pearl shiny dentures
He knows they will
For
They are hungry, starving, famished
He also knows they will throw away all ten
When they bite into one bad apple
Sep 14, 2010
Sep 14, 2010 at 7:13 AM UTC
"Buy a Star!
Own a Star!"
The sales are brisk,
For cross-eyed lovers,
Cross-hearted, lost,
Beneath the spinning constellations
Burning immortal exhalations,
Desiring forever oxytoxic bliss,
Burning ******* and hearts
Yearn longevity of stars....
PT Barnum saw his opportunity:
Sold cotton candy,
Hawked elephants,
Gawked dwarves,
Hid the razors from
Fierce bearded ladies,
Even sold the elephants' dung,
Provender to exotic gardens....
Barnum's packing up
The Pachyderms,
So Hawkers have us
Gazing on the stars....
"Step right up! See the stars!"
Purchase your fire in the sky!
Your lover's name,
Fixed in the firmament
A million years!
At least the cotton candy
And the elephant dung
Served some earthy, earthly good,
Paid dentists' children's college,
Fertilized the family food.
So now go claim a distant star,
A million, billion miles away,
Its light must make its journey
A thousand years or more
To greet your eyes, and yet,
Your lover's sighs predict
A hundred dollars' better spent
Than on a good Chablis,
Cementing mortal love in
Distant stars so permanent,
Visited through telescopic glass
Atop our rented tenements.
Mar 14, 2015
Mar 14, 2015 at 9:02 PM UTC
He came as an orphan
June 26th, 1865
Having seen
the death of his mother
Chased and speared by a hunter
First African elephant
in Europe
At the London Zoo
All alone
in all of Europe
How he broke and wore his tusks
In the iron of his enclosure
In night pain from toothaches
From many rotten teeth
Caused by his only grass hay diet
Given whiskey and beer to calm
Shared with his keeper
Matthew Scott, a difficult man
With no close friends
But with a deep empathy for animals
Who drank whiskey
with Jumbo
Into the late, lonely night
Jumbo liked whiskey, beer
and lots of sticky buns
A problematic elephant
With a Jekyll and Hyde character
Sold for 2,000 pounds
To PT Barnum
as a star attraction
Jumbo tearing his chains away
Then sitting like a mule
Until he knew his keeper
Would also ride the boat
Across the big pond
Barnum’s Scott
Made a deal
Queen Victoria wasn’t happy
Her children had sat
And rode upon his back
Jumbomania in America
Accompanied his arrival
20 million saw him alive
Brooklyn bridge opened in 1882
A year before Jumbo arrived
Then 17 May, 1884
Twenty elephants
marched across
All the way to Brooklyn
led by Jumbo
The bridge vibrated and rebounded
In St Thomas, Ontario, Canada
was his suffering demise
The day the circus train came to town
Tom Thumb and Jumbo
Were waiting to get loaded
Perhaps bumped in the ****
By the speeding freight locomotive
Internal bleeding
and a slow death
Tom Thumb only a broken leg
Jumbo in a slow death
Scott in a slow death afterwards
Having witnessed
the last breath
Of his best friend
Photographed (a recent novelty)
just after his death in B&W
Poor dead Jumbo
Scott at his head
Weeping inconsolably
Although PT Barnum
In pure PT Barnum invention
Says Jumbo ran headfirst
Into the freight locomotive
To save his keeper and Tom Thumb
Jumbo died
at twenty-four
still young
and growing
in size and girth
His stuffed mounted skin
burned at Tufts University
except the unbroken bones
plus the end of his tail
“And this is what remains of Jumbo”
Yesterday, I saw wild elephants on the banks of the Zambezi river
near Victoria Falls
Tomorrow I’m hoping to touch Jumbo’s bones in New York City
And walk the Brooklyn Bridge
© 2017 Jim Davis
Nov 15, 2018
Nov 15, 2018 at 12:42 PM UTC
this heartbreak isn't textbook. it isn't like those movies, or those books, or anyone's anything. bracing yourself for impact is an impossibility. nothing - and listen to me when I say nothing - can prepare you for this pain. you begin to miss everything. everything you thought you'd never miss: his obnoxious little brother and his father playing guitar too loud and the way his mother said the word "vegetables" and never having enough room to sleep. now I don't think I could get close enough to you if I tired. the closest I am getting to you these days is when your sign is next to my sign in a horoscope. and I know you don't believe in those but this is the only hope I have left. the barnum statements of romance hold no weight until I am told that we are perfect for each other. do you believe in alternate universes? maybe in another world we are happy together, eating popsicles and sharing sticky kisses. the truth is this poem is wearing on me. I'm tired of discussing the possibility of there being another you and another me together happy on a somewhere else far away. I am tired of writing the I miss you poem. I am tired.
note: I will continue to write the I miss you poem until my fingers break.
Apr 25, 2016
Apr 25, 2016 at 9:57 AM UTC
The Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey
Circus will close its doors in May.
The Greatest Show on Earth has lost
Its flashy allure of yesterday.
The death-defying acrobats
Will have to seek other employment.
Exotic animal acts no longer
Are a source of great enjoyment.
The circus will fold up its tent for good.
But don't be sad; do not frown.
On January 20
A new circus is coming to town.
- by Bob B (1-16-17)
Jan 16, 2017
Jan 16, 2017 at 9:44 AM UTC
Give the suckers what they want. PT Barnum
Vibrating condoms that stay hard when you can't.
Pigeons that don't **** Invisibility cloaks.
Parents with a mute button. Happy nightmares.
Politicians with Pinnochio noses. A blow job app.
Self-repairing cars. Seduction lie detector.
A time machine. Mind reading headset. Hope.
****** pills. Portable STD scanner. Edible cups.
Gourmet cook robot. Sincerity meter. Honesty.
Gun gloves. X-ray specs, Teleporter. Laughter.
Anti-loneliness inhaler. Broken heart tape.
Complete do it yourself dental care kit.
Many other brightly colored useless objects.
Find an Angel. Do a start-up. Go public.
The American Dream: have more money than god.
~mce
Mar 8, 2016
Mar 8, 2016 at 10:50 AM UTC
The first kind of carnival I encountered besides at the county fair was a huge one on the far outer reaches of the North Bronx on the way to Yonkers and White Plains call Freedomland.
I remember Disneyland and the black licorice drops there at the old time confectionary store. I hope to go to Disney World in my lifetime.
AS far as a regular circus I went to one when I was on a locked ward (we were let out under supervision) at the Lyons New Jersey UAMC. I was so desperately feeling like a failure due to confinement, and felt such hopelessness, that I contemplated joining the circus as a roustabout, but it seemed futile in the big picture, after all, I felt because I'd just be going from the frying pan into the fire success or lack thereof wise.
I think I noticed a certain clown looking at me out of the corner of his eyes and reading my mind there and letting me know I'd mad e the fright decision, and seeing a choice female acrobat stride by that reminded me that I wanted to start a family someday and stars of circuses are probably kept separate from the roustabouts.
I can remember going to the Ringling Bros. and Barnum and Bailey circus with my mother as a kid and being thrilled at the taste of the cotton candy, the lion tamer doing his thing , the smell of the sawdust, and the ringmaster of that 3 ring circus and his whip. I was in awe.
In the meantime I was going to local carnivals and trying my hand with the pellet gun shooting sitting ducks that passed by in front of the king in the hall of mirrors, and going on the roller coasters and the Ferris wheel.
Later I went to the Barnum and Bailey circus as an adult and the trapeze artist, especially the female ones and , for example the parade of the Arabian horsed, thrilled me too.
I also took my foster son to a carnival and the sorta juvenile delinquent erstwhile deprived kid-he was, I though. I got a thrill out of him seeming impressed.
Enough of this, not that it's syrupy sentimentality, which I find enough in my poetry to have a sense of failure there but maybe kind of exercise in senility.
Feb 16, 2017
Feb 16, 2017 at 1:42 PM UTC
Just take a look at us. We live in a
Barnum & Bailey world
And we're just
A pair of
clowns
Sep 7, 2014
Sep 7, 2014 at 12:22 PM UTC
I can't be no more than three
To the circus, Barnum and Bailey
My blonde hair, a dress and big blue eyes
I am just as cute as I can be
My brother and sisters came too
My moms hands are full, what a zoo
Just so I won't get separated
Her soft, old brown coat I hold onto
The smells are all delicious here
Popcorn, cotton candy and good cheer
So many colors and sparkly things
I will get some later, it is clear
We take our seats I can barely see
On dads lap watching the menagerie
Elephants, lions, tigers and clowns!
So excited dad can hardly hold me
The music, drum beats and all the sound
The ladies on horseback ride around
The man on the trapeze soars very high
I'm sure he is miles up off the ground
We walk all the way up real big stairs
Past laughing people in their chairs
Hold onto that coat with all my might
I am having such fun, I have no cares
We bump and weave all thru the crowd
My mom and dad will be so proud
When I look up to see my mommys hair
It is grey! Wrong coat! I squeal aloud
Well I'll just have to find the car
Know they'll be there, it's not too far
The streets and parking lots are packed
I am lost and about to cry hard
I thought and searched and there it stood
My nice grandmas car, that's her hood
I waited for at least a year
Clown came by to help, he could
He took my hand in his huge glove
He dried my tears, thank God above
I missed my mom and dad....bad
Clown gave me ice cream filled with love
Over the loud speaker, announced my name
My frantic parents, on the run they came
Mom hugged me tight like she's never seen me
It was time to leave, what a **** shame
Sep 25, 2013
Sep 25, 2013 at 11:10 AM UTC
Sunlight playing on my tapping foot
Wishing this bus could ride forever
The images seen through glass, flash and pass
Manifest into destination
And my stomach lurches
Butterflies for the past and future
Dec 9, 2012
Dec 9, 2012 at 1:42 PM UTC
Carnivores in the cabinet
Theology through and through
Mothers can be so mysterious
Babies born into Barnum & Bailey's
Karate kicking you in the ****
Piercing through your pathetic *****
Dangerous days and dumbed-down digital
Filming from the foyer, frame by frame
Losing your lackeys
Can't find your car keys
Utmost ulterior and undulating oceans
Aliens acting antsy
Dogs doing down-beat digging
Anti-aging advertisements in America
Over our own oak trees
People picking in Peru
Sensing something sinister sliding silently south
Apr 26, 2016
Apr 26, 2016 at 4:37 PM UTC
RIP: The greatest show on earth
The announcement came:
This was the last year for the circus–
The working man's circus,
The last ******* child of Ringling Brothers
And P.T. Barnum
Good, my wife said
Think about the animals.
I nod in absent agreement -
But I am at Coney Island as it might have been, once.
And watching amusement parks in Celeron, Bay Ridge, the Palisades and a hundred others places vanish -
One by one like altar candles extinguished before the recessional.
I am a young boy staying up late tearing through Ray Bradbury's "Something Wicked this Way Comes"
while everyone else in the house is sleeping.
I am at a City Lights book store in San Francisco
Where Lawrence Ferlinghetti is sharing his cotton candy with Diane Arbus and Allen Ginsburg
I am listening to "Take Five" in stereophonic sound.
I am behind the Big-Top
with Edgar Allan Poe and Charles Dickens
trying to catch a glimpse of the show through the shadows -
Then being told to get away by a large sweaty man who doesn't smile.
I am eating peanuts salted in the shell.
I am holding my daughters tiny hand
while my son hides behind me–
a clown is walking by.
Nov 17, 2020
Nov 17, 2020 at 5:01 AM UTC
Donald Trumpy went to town
A-riding as a phony
Flipped the bird at the world
And called it macaroni!
Donald Trumpy, keep it up
Donald Trumpy dandy
Burn the party, elect the Shrill
and with the votes be handy!
All of us went down to see,
The proof of Barnum's wisdom
Lined up many suckers there
As thick as hasty pudding.
Chorus
He said we'll build a wall so high
that Mexicans can't jump it
Made of gold and paid for too
by Mexico on credit!
Chorus
His first task as president
to find Obama's birthplace
Unless you think that just a ruse
to win the party's base!
Sep 14, 2016
Sep 14, 2016 at 5:13 PM UTC
I made a bet today.
If I came home
To a gloomy, empty house,
I'd say it's over and end it all.
But today was different.
I saw my father
Sat on the table
Eating his lunch.
He was never home early.
He spends the night here to sleep.
And the rest of the day at work.
Never had time to talk.
He called me over
"Son, let's eat."
With barely a smile
I take my seat.
He says "You're home early"
I nod and chew away.
A spoon or two later, he asks
"Tell me about your day."
It was lazy, the usual,
And spent alone like any other.
Is what I'd say
If I could be honest, father.
My father finished his meal
Gave me a pat on the head
And went back out to work.
"Goodbye son, stay safe okay?"
It was weird to me.
We barely ever talk.
But It felt warm for a second.
For second, then I brushed it off.
I thought I was alone again.
Time's about up, right?
But the bedroom door opens.
And out comes my sister.
She slept like a rock.
She woke up at noon!
But she's a grown up, older than me.
That's bound to change soon.
But like a child with a request,
She says "I wanna watch a movie!"
"You're old enough to do that yourself."
"But I can't decide which."
She says "Tell me what's new."
"The Greatest Showman?
You really wanted to see that."
Her sleepy face lit up, "Yes!"
So I play my copy of the movie.
And watched the logos fly.
The intro plays
The minutes passed by.
A young P. T. Barnum sang
My sister tries to catch the song.
So I sing alongside her to help.
And she got the chorus before long.
I swear, she's two years older.
But she's like a precious child.
She stared at the screen with glee
And a smile so wide.
I felt oddly warm to see her that way.
Like the smile was my doing.
"I like this movie!"
"I knew you would."
"It's weird though," she tells me.
"It's weird to see Wolverine singing"
She burts in a heap of laughter.
I couldn't help but feel warmer.
I came home with a bet today,
Like my life was on a coin toss.
But now I feel stupid.
I wouldn't miss out on this.
So maybe I'm depressed.
And maybe the world's a bit rough...
But days like these,
They'll keep me happy enough.
Apr 30, 2018
Apr 30, 2018 at 6:58 PM UTC