There are Clowns and then Clowns

Knights in colorful armor have died out

Am I the first clown you ever knew? Billy Smart once told me that clowns were in short supply. He had jugglers, trapeze artists, tightrope walkers, fire-eaters, even women who do strange things with snakes, but the clown he told me, sadly, is in decline.

We don’t laugh at big feet, red noses, baggy trousers, and doors that fall off cars when you open them. Why not? These days, the modern clown wears a suit and looks as though he could take his place as Prime Minister or President at the head of a country. Even if that political clown wore a red clip-on nose, it doesn’t associate him with the traditional circus clown. It’s just a man in a suit wearing a red nose.

A tiny segment in the brain of a circus clown distinguishes him from any other kind of man. This can be seen more clearly in his heart’s shape, for the heart of a clown is somewhat ‘raggedy’ where his business’s wear and tear have torn the arteries and miss-shaped the contours. A clown is a knight without armor; he leaves behind the enigma of absence and yet the sure knowledge that he believes in you. You never really understand whether you know a clown, but if you believe in him, he will make you laugh. A clown loves not at all wisely, he just loves, and if he can believe in you, he can believe in Heaven. He can believe in peace.