The Centaurean Strut

Hexamylean and semi equine, Terpsichorean and feelin' just fine.

I don't do a lot of short stuff. 5-6000 words seems to be my sweet spot but that's asking a lot of potential readers. So this is a nice change, a bit of flash written for the Stop Writing Alone summer prompt.

A large marquee of yellowed canvas has been erected on a patch of waste ground at the foot of the walls, on the south side of the city, in an area where old furniture goes to die and yellow dogs chase cats and children along dusty roadways and the porches of the few cottages that survived the great flood of ‘63 are decorated with empty beer bottles suspended by strings from the guttering. They chime softly at the first stirrings of a breeze. A number of smaller tents are arranged in a crescent formation around the big top, providing accommodation for performers who do not require the main stage, novelty acts and freaks, a geek, a fortune teller, a man with an educated dragon on his shoulder, a magician, an escapologist who claims to be able to open any lock with his bare hands and occasional use of his toes.

By early evening a substantial crowd has gathered. Tony Smith, proprietor of UNCLE TONY’S PERIPATETIC WORLD OF WONDER AND DELIGHT is collecting the takings, and judging by the size of the crowd and the weight of the cash tins, it is going to be a good night. A half dozen burly figures, dressed all in black and recruited that afternoon in nearby taverns for the price of a free ticket for the show and a few glasses of strong liquor, are gathered around the slit in the canvas which serves as the entrance, keeping an eye out for queue jumpers, pickpockets and other potential troublemakers. Thanks to Uncle Tony’s policy of recruiting security staff locally most of the doormen have had previous dealings with the likely miscreants and they are ready for trouble. No firearms, but each one carrying a sap that they rhythmically slap into the palms of their hands, partly for purposes of general menace, but mostly for the pleasure of hearing leather on skin.

A signal from somewhere in the wings and the overhead lights dim and the crowd falls silent. Anticipatory glances are exchanged between neighbours, their eyes widening in the twilit tent. Bottoms shuffle excitedly on the chairs in the stalls, newly unfolded and arranged in rows across the width of the stage. Further back rise the steeply raked bleachers, a wave of steel and wood that climbs into the darkness that gathers beneath the canvas roof where several large moths, confused by the sudden removal of the beacons on which they rely for navigation, are making repeated sallies at the canvas, trying to get through to the moon, in whose meagre light the show continues for several seconds.

There is a brief pause to ensure that the crowd is properly settled, during which the sound of hooves and soft whinnying can be heard from backstage and a sudden gust of cold air blows through the tent, rippling the canvas roof, causing it to flap noisily. In the gloaming a technician comes onto the stage to light the footlights and the small band, drums, guitar and piano accordion, hidden away in the wings, strike up the Entry of the Torreadors. With a clatter of hooves on boards four female centaurs, accoutred in harness of leather and lace and black silk brassieres and knickerbockers and a sequinned sock on each hoof, make their way onto and across the low stage in a line.

As she reaches the far side of the stage the lead mare slows the procession down and turns to face the audience, many of whom are already whooping and bellowing their pleasure at the unfolding spectacle, this being a town whose people know good horseflesh when they see it. Her companions follow suit and when all four are facing the audience, with ears pricked and smiles that seem to glow in the limelight, each one extends her right arm, kneels on her right foreknee and bows deeply to the assembled company.

The centaurettes are of different colours - one black, one white, one red and one pale and when they have taken the applause for their bow they begin to dance, slowly at first, but the quicker and quicker, their spangled hooves tapping out complex syncopations on the boards and causing dust to rise from the ground below. Then as the music reaches its first climax of the evening, each one lifts her forefeet and stands on hind legs and executes a partial turn so that when she lowers herself she is leaning across the silk clad haunches of the dancer in front and together they began to circle the stage with a pulsing, rhythmic gait holding their hands out in front of themselves, moving them back and forwards alternately in a manner resembling a railway locomotive and issuing whistling and chugging sounds and as they did so they sang -

THE CENTAUREAN STRUT

The night is dark

The stars are bright

Come on down to the

Centaur circus tonight!

We’re putting on greasepaint

We’re taking our chance

To get brushed up and groomed

And let these old hooves dance

Were looking awfully neat

From withers to feet

Come in out of the rain

And give your eyeballs a treat.

Because we’re hexamylean

And semi equine

Terpsichorean

And feelin’ just fine

Gonna ring them bells

Raise them roofs

Jazz these hands

Tap these hoofs

We got two strong arms to hold you tight

And four fine legs

And were gonna shake them right

They're gonna hear us from east to the west

From the north up to the south

We're a kind of horse with a special gift

So don't you dare look in our mouths

So do we want to sit and have a nice long rest?

Oh believe me anything but

Tonight is the night

when everything’s right

for the CENTAUREAN STRUT.