When I was a child, I did something terrible by not speaking up when I should have. I saw something so frightening, I was too afraid to report it. I couldn’t even tell my parents about it. It has haunted me throughout my entire life and I have been seeing her face more and more lately.
Now as an adult, I live everyday with my cowardice, knowing that I allowed the unspeakable to continue. I can never take it back, I will never live it down, but I must try to get it out of my head somehow.
The Circus Came to Town
by Thadd Presley
Damp, dark,
a clank, a spark
a white light,
so bright
my eyes
shut tight.
It was years before,
when I was only a boy
a circus came to town
with elephants and joy
A tent
so large
all the people in town
could come right in
and look at the clowns.
In my delight, I got lost
For my family I looked
and down a dark hallway,
I saw a little girl was took.
A thick curtain fell down,
and covered the way.
I didn’t see anything
But I heard the man say.
“Come one, come all,
Gather around ya’ll.
See the beautiful Chinese
and the Japanese dolls”
But this girl I then saw
was so skinny, so thin,
with long, blond hair
she was locked up tight
a chain under her chin.
She was scarred and so young.
She spoke up quickly,
she whispered:
“Get out of here! RUN!!!”
Her eyes were so wide,
from the shock of my sight
she shook in her cage,
and her necklace of chains
“RUN!!” She cried,
“they’ll be back again!”
Afraid for my life,
Finally I did.
I stand here now
Before the world
To tell of that place,
those chains,
and that girl.