Practicing to Walk Like a Heron

Night on the Circus Lot

112 Night on the Circus Lot The big cats sleep. The drivers, too, each chin against a chest, knees still bent and pressed against a dashboard, their trucks parked between the stakes that mark where to unload the riggings, poles, and canvas when the first light falls over the lot. Straw boss makes his rounds, flashlight beam leading from truck to truck to camper to the semi where the roustabouts snore four high in their bunks. He looks under each rig, his light raking the grass for a loose wire, leak, thief, kid wanting to leave town hiding behind a tire of a sixteen wheeler. The night’s common quiet counterpoints the generator’s hum, the steady center of the show.” It’s hot, humid, clear, the stars reliable in their singular space. He sees a light on in Don Axelia’s Airstream, walks over, waves his beam across the silver half-shine of the tightrope walker’s home, sees him sitting at his little foldout table, turning the pages of the local paper. 113 Don Axelia looks up, squints, comes to the door. “Saw your light. Thought I’d better check. Everyone’s in for the night, even Kenny with his arms around a bottle.” “I’m fine. You were a wire walker. You know how it is.” Straw boss nods. “I do. Try and get some sleep.” He turns off the flashlight. He knows his way back through the dark. ...