At night at the circus
Is the big top empty
Clowns, acrobats, freaks
Tucked cozy in bed
Crowds so too at home
Children dreaming of
Wonder, thrills, and joy
All the animals fed and
Down for the night
Silence reigns the
Deserted tent?
Oh, think again
It is not so
The show must go on
Generations of performers
Departed are there
Some reprise their final,
Fatal performance endlessly
The fall from the high wire
The tiger rebels forever
Mauling the Tamer
All of them trapped
Keeping the show going
In the shadowy borderland
Between Life and Death

Bob Wertzler is retired from almost twenty years in the mental health field in California and Arizona. There are times the title, “Recovering Therapist”, seems to fit. In 2006 he retired to move to Western North Carolina to help and become primary care giver for his father who had developed Dementia. Before all that, there was work at various times as a soldier (US Army 1967-70), community organizer, cab driver, welfare case worker, wooden toy maker, carpenter, warehouse worker, and other things. He relates to a line in a Grateful Dead song, “What a long, strange trip its been.”