Doomwright

The Laughing Man — DOOMWRIGHT

THE LAUGHING MAN — album cover, a scarred face half-swallowed by darkness with a single tear catching the light, in dark bronze-gold oil
Blackened death metal · after Victor Hugo's L'Homme qui rit, 1869

The Laughing Man

On YouTube now · streaming September 10

A child's face is carved into a grin he can never lose, and the world pays nightly to laugh at it. Only a blind girl ever sees the man behind the mask — and only the sea is honest enough to take him back.

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The Argument

As a child he is put ashore on a frozen coast at night and left to die, and his face is bought and rebuilt by careful hands into a permanent grin — a lifetime's laugh sewn into living skin, for profit.

He survives the whiteout carrying a freezing infant girl, and a bitter travelling philosopher takes them both into his wagon. The girl, Dea, is blind — and so she is the only one who ever reads him by warmth and weight instead of by the ruin of his face.

The world makes him a spectacle. Crowds pay nightly to laugh at the carved grin; a duchess collects him as the ultimate curiosity; and when it is found that he was born a lord, the title restores everything except the face, and the face cancels the title.

Then Dea dies, and the one place he was ever seen whole goes dark. He steps off a night pier into the black water, following the only soul who ever saw the man and not the mask.

A face made to lie about him forever — and the sea the last honest thing left.

Ten movements

The Laughing Man, in full

Two voices carry the record — a deep guttural growl for the body, the grief, the earth, and a blackened rasp for the cold and the cruelty of the crowd. No clean voice ever comes.

ILeft for the Ice to Raisewords
Oars in the black, retreating Salt mouths that will not speak They weighed the small against the storm And chose the storm to keep The shore is bone and iron The night comes down like law No door in all the frozen world No hand, no fire, no thaw And overhead a dead man turns On chains the wind rehearses Left for the ice to raise Fathered by falling snow The first face bent above the child Swung hollow, to and fro Small footprints north to nowhere The cold counts every one Whatever name the water took The winter gives him none Left for the ice to raise Fathered by falling snow The world showed him its true face first And let the man's face go
IISutured Laughterwords
Steady hands and quiet knives A craft passed down like sin They measured out a lifetime's laugh And sewed the sorrow in Merchants of the altered flesh Sculptors of the sold They signed their work in living skin And left it there to hold Beneath the seam the child remains Screaming down a sealed refrain Sutured laughter, wound made grin The face a cage, the boy within Every mirror tells the lie A mouth that laughs, and cannot cry Grief will wear this grin to the grave Joy nailed over pain Whatever weather moves the heart The mask stays fair and vain Sutured laughter, wound made grin The face a cage, the boy within The sculptors sleep in easy beds Their masterpiece will laugh till dead
IIITwo Heartbeats in the Whiteoutwords
The plain is white and merciless The sky has closed its eye Each step a war the body wins That mind cannot supply A woman cold beneath the drift Gave all she had to give One ember pressed against his chest Deciding he would live Carry what the world threw down Carry it or drown Two heartbeats in the whiteout One fire the frost can't find The night takes everything that stops He will not stop, or mind Small breath against the howling Small weight that anchors all The storm has never met a thing Too stubborn yet to fall The dark is long, the flesh is small The cold is patient stone But two together in the waste Outlast the night alone Two heartbeats in the whiteout One fire the frost can't find The night takes everything that stops He will not stop, or mind
IVThe Only Eyes That Never Liedwords
She reads the world through fingertips Through warmth and weight and tone The dark she lives in has no thrones No mirrors and no stone They flinch, they stare, they pay to point She rests against the scar And names him by his beating heart Not by the things they are All seeing eyes have lied to him The only eyes that never lied Are eyes that never saw She holds the face the world defiled And finds no face at all If light is what the sighted serve Then let the light grow dim The whole world laughing missed the man The blind girl gathered him The only eyes that never lied Are eyes that never saw She holds the face the world defiled And finds no face at all
VGospel of the Rolling Housewords
He preaches to the starving That men are made of fraud Then breaks his bread in equal thirds And swears at his own God The wolf sleeps at the children's feet More faithful than the town Four legs and never sold a soul Two legs would sell the crown Curse loudly, and give quietly Gospel of the rolling house Sermons made of scorn The kindest hands in all the land Pretend to hold a thorn He took in what the snow spat out Two ruins at his door Complained about the mouths to feed And quietly fed them more The road is home, the home is wheels The wheels outrun the law A hut of boards holds more of heaven Than any hall he saw Gospel of the rolling house Sermons made of scorn The kindest hands in all the land Pretend to hold a thorn
VIApplause Like Breaking Glasswords
They queue beneath the lanterns Coins sweating in their palms To buy an hour of laughter Cut into living calm The curtain is a guillotine That falls the other way It shows the head still talking And lets the crowd make prey They think the mask is smiling back The mask thinks of the sea Applause like breaking glass A thousand mouths, one hunger They love him as a wound on stage And laugh the knife in longer Roar, you gilded gallery Roar until you're hoarse The thing you feed on nightly Was a child once, of course Applause like breaking glass A thousand mouths, one hunger They love him as a wound on stage And laugh the knife in longer
VIIErmine and Rotwords
Perfume above the charnel Lace above the claw The high-born practice cruelty The way the priests keep law She wants him as a jewel wants light To hold what none possess Desire dressed as fascination Hunger dressed in dress The palace is a patient mouth Ermine and rot, ermine and rot The crown is clean, the root is not They dine on what the gutter grows And wipe their lips on silk and snow Ten thousand starve politely Beyond the garden wall Their hunger keeps the music soft In the eternal ball Come closer, little miracle Be monstrous, be my own The beautiful collect the maimed The way the sea takes stone Ermine and rot, ermine and rot The crown is clean, the root is not They dine on what the gutter grows And wipe their lips on silk and snow
VIIICrowned in the Wrong Mirrorwords
Born in the mud, raised on the boards A name the roadside gave Now parchment says the mud was wrong The blood was born to rave They dress the scar in ermine They seat the wound in state Lords bow to what they'd point at Outside the palace gate Which one is the costume Which one is the skin Crowned in the wrong mirror Titled, and erased The lord looks out, the freak looks back Two strangers in one face And she — she cannot follow here Where names outweigh the heart The only world that saw him whole Is the world they tore apart Velvet is a deeper cold Than any coast he walked The halls applaud his lineage The way the fairground gawked Crowned in the wrong mirror Titled, and erased The lord looks out, the freak looks back Two strangers in one face
IXWhere Her Voice Used to Livewords
The lamp is out that never burned The dark she lived in — spread It fills the wagon, fills the world It sits where warmth once fed Her hands knew every scar by heart And called them only him Now no one in the breathing world Can see past the grin Tear down the tent, the boards, the sky Burn every lantern black The only eyes that never lied Are closed and won't come back Where her voice used to live There is a hole in every sound The world is just the noise it makes Around the missing ground No grief was ever quiet long It learns to howl, it learns And what the heart cannot hold in The whole horizon burns
XThe Sea Keeps What It Loveswords
The land was never his to keep Its titles or its scorn It carved him, sold him, crowned him, laughed And left him twice as torn Behind him every lantern dies The stage, the court, the claim The only voice that knew his heart Went out the way she came The water asks for nothing The water wears no mask The sea keeps what it loves And loves what men throw down No mirror moves beneath the waves No laughter, and no crown One step from wood to water One breath from noise to none Whatever face the black waves hold It lies to no one, no one The sea keeps what it loves And loves what men throw down Where she has gone the dark is kind And he will not be found
The Illuminations

Nine plates from the long walk

A child kneeling on a snowy night coast watching a boat row away over a moonlit sea, a hanged man on a gibbet nearby, dark oil painting
The boat pulls away; the gibbet keeps watch.I · Left for the Ice to Raise
A candlelit worktable holding a pale carved mask, a spool of coarse thread, scissors and small tools, in dark bronze oil
The craft that measured out a lifetime's laugh.II · Sutured Laughter
A blindfolded young woman cradling the scarred man's face in both hands, foreheads close, against black, in warm gold oil
The only eyes that never lied were eyes that never saw.IV · The Only Eyes That Never Lied
A bearded man, two ragged children and a wolf beside a lantern-lit travelling wagon at dusk, a distant town glowing on the horizon
The only home in the story has wheels.V · Gospel of the Rolling House
A scarred man standing among a crowd of figures in top hats wearing grinning pale masks, dark gold oil painting
They love him as a wound on stage.VI · Applause Like Breaking Glass
A richly dressed noblewoman reaching up to hold the scarred man's face in a candlelit hall of watching courtiers
The beautiful collect the maimed.VII · Ermine and Rot
A figure in an ermine robe facing a gilt mirror that reflects him ragged and scarred, in a dark opulent hall
The lord looks out, the freak looks back.VIII · Crowned in the Wrong Mirror
A lone dark figure standing in a dim lantern-lit wagon interior beside an empty bed, warm shadows all around
It sits where warmth once fed.IX · Where Her Voice Used to Live
A dark night pier by the sea with a lit lantern and a cloak left draped over the railing, still black water beyond
The sea keeps what it loves.X · The Sea Keeps What It Loves