Ilsa was an acrobat who went and fell in love with that Horatio the human cannonball A wedding 'neath the big top tent with barkers clowns and elephants Sideshow family oddities and all The dog-faced boy howled out with joy As the tattooed lady was crying Ever since the beginning to keep the world spinning It takes all kinds of kinds Thomas was a congressman with closets full of skeletons And dresses that he wore on Friday nights Phyllis was a pharmacist, a dab of that, a pinch of this Concocted to suppress her appetite When the children were fiddlin' she'd slip 'em some Ritalin And wait for Thomasina to arrive Cause ever since the beginning to keep the world spinning It takes all kinds of kinds, all kinds of kinds When I play this old guitar from children's shows to smoky bars I take a break and think about the past When I stood up in geometry and everybody stared at me And I tossed my test into the trash I scratched off my number while hitching out under That bush league population sign Ever since the beginning to keep the world spinning It takes all kinds of kinds Now some point the finger, let ignorance linger If they'd look in the mirror they'd find That ever since the beginning to keep the world spinning It takes all kinds of kinds All kinds of kinds All kinds of kinds