Julian the Onion

Logger Days, savannah, the menagerie packed its trains
left Bitter Root, Montana for those old Nebraska plains
Ticket sales were suffering now, with half the animals gone
but the circus kept its course somehow and the show continued on
Pitched their tents in Battle Creek on a makeshift flatbed stage
with a draytop shotgun rhino's peak and a black wrought iron cage
The barker sprung to action as the band began to play
to introduce the new attraction who they'd picked up on the way

Julian the Onion who they'd picked up on the way

[BARKER:] "Cleanse your minds and palates, as I seldom mince my words,
This poor boy's a walking shallot; yes, it's shocking as you've heard!
From his lonesome, yellow childhood, so fantastically deformed,
He was battered by his classmates and sauteed like bantam corn
'Red Vidalias!' 'Valley Sweets!' for twelve long, rotten years
if he so much as skinned his knee, the entire schoolhouse moved to tears
We found him where he'd sprouted, plotting a garden coup d'etat
in a carrot stick and celery stalk manage-a-mirepoix
Now, feast your caramel eyes on the most savory sight in town!"
All his joking well-evoking peals of laughter from the crowd

But Julian the Onion was not laughing with the crowd

His jaundiced face was trembling, beads of sweat began to fall
Down his oblong gooseback forehead to his snuffed-out lantern jaw
his cut-shoot sprig of hair disheveled, tiny fists impearled
[JULIAN:] "No I am not this misshaped body, and I'm not long for this world
Wooden dimes and quiet fears, come curl your lips at me
but all perceptions are as mirrors, it's your own reflections that you see
So hide behind your laughs a while, look handsome though you may,
oh, do enjoy that saccharine smile, as there comes for you a day"