The Hearse on the Other Side of the Canvas

Frank Stanford

I die a gigolo every night in the ballet a cheval
So my patrons can go home alone
And stay awake at their windows for hours
Writing me messages by the light of the moon
If all goes well tonight
I'll draw the most tears
I'll have another stocking for my head
It is almost time again
The clown with the black crosses
I drew on his eyes is winding the victrola
He is about to blow the sawdust off the dirge
When the tightrope walker executes
Her last bow for the evening
When the blue light hits her hand
Turning towards the ground like a wounded dove
The horses will gallop into the third ring with me
I will arrive lying in state
So l can ride out alive and on my own
I have come to know the timing of my death
Like a dancer who has finished
Every season I die in the countryside
For the same looks the same barefeet
If all goes well she will be there
In the edge of the light
Looking back over her shoulders
Undoing the ribbons of her hair and slippers
The victrola's wound
It is time for me to enter the tent
For the wheels to be moving
But all I can do is mumble to myself
Outside the wind has blown
Feathers and moths from the grills of the trucks
And the wagon beds are clean of their hay
The dwarf polishes the mahogany with his sleeve
And the wind takes the tickets
From the coachman's palm
He is asleep
His whip and cloak are as they were
All I want to do
Is move
The earth where you sleep without sleeping
That moon another bride with child
I hold underwater
Still I'm nothing but a mime
My face is cold
As a snow that wakes up a statue
I wait with my lute like a suitor
In the brave shadows
Cast in the courtyard of the dead
I1ve taken away the ladies of all forms
The four of them know my horses and songs
Alone in the middle of the night
I've turned up in their hands
Like the Ace of sorrows
I bring you tonight
The same black flowers I gave
By darkness they are thrown
By light they are taken
I keep breath in my body
Wearing the tight costume of silence
I give you what I will take from you
Tomorrow night I dream
The intercepted messages
The dust in my boots
And you have to hide me out in the barn
And tend me till morning
I sleep in the afternoon
Then I travel the low road
Combing the straw out of my hair
Keeping your scent black as caviar
This is an adventure
The world is a circus I put in my ear
And I am a rider
Riding two plumed horses at once
The one is a dream the other is real
I ride inside the circle
To keep from falling
I never think about the faces
Out there in the galleries
It's too dark

Ginny Stanford