The County Fair is over, and the carnies have been up all night;
The distant, tribal dance of hammers fills the summer air.
The Ferris Wheel's in pieces now like the bones of a Brontosaurus,
And the Scrambler's arms are folded like a prodigal in prayer.
The County Fair is over, leaving us here all alone again,
With homework, chores and little sisters, and curfews back in force.
The Tilt O Whirl is gone, and I got half a mind to chase it;
Grab the reins and ride the highway on the back of a carousel horse.
Tomorrow when we go to school the only sign that they'd been here,
Will be an oblong scar of dirt where the midway used to be.
We'll tell the tales of freakish things we paid a quarter twice to watch,
And how Marty Miller lost his lunch on a ride called Stormy Sea.
Weeks will pass; we'll watch TV, and hear the news of men in space,
And Vietnam, and Malcolm X, and Martin Luther King.
And it will be expected, we're to grow up like our parents did,
And get that job in town and set aside these childish things.
But I remember, clean as rain, that half a mile of open field,
That somehow turned to magic on that third week of July,
Where elephants and freaks would come
And open wide our small town eyes,
And show us anything could happen, anything at all could happen,
Underneath a summer sky.
