THE SAD ILLUSIONIST

Once upon a time, in a rather sad town, as in a rather sad world; an illusionist came by... an illusionist who could pretend having a heart...

He came by, talking the most beautiful nonsense you have ever heard, so you can know I will quote; "Let´s just imagine we can smile, for a moment shall we? Ok now, have you pictured it already? Are you ready? Ok then! Let the show begin!" He would triumphantly say. And indeed the show began in that precise moment, doves, rabbits; even monkeys would appear as he walked, he would greet the town with a proper smile and finally get downtown.

There a fountain would be waiting for him to sit in it, welcoming, and so he would accept the invitation, animals, children and adults would look at him quite impressed; so he smiled and took a bit of water to make it dance, the water would look as a doll, as a puppet it followed orders. Suddenly it would rise to his hands to be embraced in both gloves, just to let out a beautiful ice rose, and slowly he would take it and in a sudden blink of an eye stab it to the ground, which was followed by a joyful scream; "Let's enjoy the ice!" The town was in the dearest winter of all, covered with snow, then I saw him go round and round in the brightest skates of all, he was playing and laughing; but his smile, oh dear his smile, you could name all the beautiful things in the world, yet his smile would make them all fade away.

In the middle of this cold breeze, of these dancing snowflakes, I felt how my chest and my cheeks were warm; I could feel something beating inside of me, this was a rather strange feeling to me, so I would just hug to my mother's lap to wait for an answer, and then… it just happened, he was staring at me, with that beautiful smile, he started skating, nearer and nearer till he was in front of me; and then he talked "That is your heart dear boy, let it beat with joy", then he would go away skating, playing tricks and taking out a smile to my face.

Suddenly we were all smiling and cheering, all our hearts beating for the same tune, we were the orchestra and he was our prime director; so he would skate to the end of town, the winter would follow him, and so did we, all the town was watching him go, then he turned around and his skates would disappear and with a clap the ice rose would be again in his hands. He threw it to the skies and it exploded to make a light show in front of our eyes, he then waved goodbye with his hat, so he could leave without regret; yet he was not alone, he had taken something from us in exchange, now we were a rather happy town, in a rather happy world. He had taken the sadness away, to make it the illusion with which he played, with which he created smiles; and only then I knew why he pretended having a heart, at least a normal one, his was one of gold indeed, one heart of gold, with which he remembered to the people, that there will always be a sad illusionist to make our hearts beat again.