I am absolutely terrified to share this video.
This is not the first time I have performed spoken word. I’ve dabbled before.
But it was the first time I performed in front of a crowd of more than fifty people. It was the first time I ever performed at a renegade show. And this is the first time I recorded my performance.
A renegade show, for those unawares, is an closed-invite, open-stage spectacle within the juggling community. While jugglers will contend that it was first “invented” at the 1986 International Juggler’s Convention in San Jose, I have seen similar types of shows hosted in non-juggling settings.
At Spinfest 2026, they combined the two together. It was not just juggling. It was music, comedy and——after a 10:45PM watershed——burlesque. And I am absolutely terrified to share my part of it all.
The thing is, that’s not new. I was terrified when I lined up. I was terrified when I was next. And I was terrified as I left the stage, knowing it had been recorded.
Recording, however, only occurred upon request, and I chose to ask someone to record it. But does that mean I have to share the video?
No.
And yet I have let a quiet terror guide my actions far too often. A quiet terror that fears perception from others. As I look deeper into the matter, however, I find that this terror is constructed.
Every cell in my body was on fire. That’s not terror. That’s adrenaline. The terror is how we react. And once I left the stage and went to join the last night of the fire circle, I was not terrified.
I was abound in ecstatic joy that a poem I wrote over the course of the festival came to fruition on the last day.
Because of fire bans, we could not play with flames during the previously scheduled nights. In light of the bushfires, only two fire circles occurred during the entire weekend. One for Thursday and one for Sunday. The beginning and the end. The alpha and the omega.
And if the first night was “show us what you know,” then the last night was “show us how you’ve grown.”
I hope you like what you see.
-The Casual Rambler
P.S. Mille mercis to Shaun for recording me. He’s a talented magician and flow artist and was absolutely kind enough to capture the photos of me writing poetry in the LED flow jam and the video of me performing spoken word. Find him here!
I’d like to give thanks to my wonderful patrons, Jennifer, Julie, Michael, Zero, Roshi and Phil, as well as the many free members of the Casual Ramble. Without you, everything that has been would not be and everything that is to come would not happen. This post was released a week early to my Patreon supporters, if you’d like to receive early access to poetry, short films and other works, you can join the Casual Ramble Patreon via the link below!
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