Memoirous

 Damn everything but the circus!   …damn everything that is grim, dull, motionless, unrisking, inward turning, damn everything that won’t get into the circle, that won’t enjoy, that won’t throw its heart into the tension, surprise, fear and delight of the circus, the round world, the full existence… --e.e. cummings I’ve tried to track down the source of this quote and found nothing but head scratching. “The first sentence is from Act I, Scene II of e.e. cummings play: Him. It is also known as "the acrobat's passage". The rest of the quote was apparently written by someone else. It does not appear in the play (published in 1927). "Damn everything but the circus!" is original with cummings, although often attributed to a female author, who may have used the quote as a title for a book. URL: https://able2know.org/topic/46665-1 Others contend It is not a poem but a part of a series of lectures titles "i Six Nonlectures" Comprising...

In 1968 at age 50 Corita (she decided to retain the name attached to her art life, Frances forever would be buried in the past) extended her sabbatical by withdrawing her vows and leaving the order. At the time she was drawn to the poetry of several transcendental writers. This is where I discovered Corita—Googling the e.e. cummings poem, Damn the circus I was considering an epigraph for my non-fiction manuscript about cycling the UK from the very top to Land’s End. I needed something that conveyed the tension, the push and pull of fear and adrenaline, the tight wire of risk. The funny thing about risk is that it makes life interesting. Those who avoid it lead safe, stable mediocre lives. It is the person who steps away, who dares to lose sight of the shore that ventures forth to discover. Sometimes we find out something entirely new about ourselves, the world when we take a chance. This high wire act has all the pros and cons of every major decision—but it is about facing these decis...