UniverSoul, world's only African American-owned circus, has poodles and passion

There is the damp mist of spring in the air and the voices of children and the aroma of funnel cakes sprinkled with powdered sugar. There is the promise of white tigers, dancing poodles, elephants and acrobats flying, pale-orange scarves trailing. The sweet, sticky smell of cotton candy blows over the huge expanse of blacktop at the Capital Plaza Mall in Landover Hills, turning the crummy parking lot of what someone once called the loneliest mall in the area into a fairy tale, with a big top under which one can expect to find happiness. If for only a couple of hours.

The circus has come to town, and it's not your everyday circus, either.

It's called UniverSoul Circus, billed as the only African American-owned circus in the world. But you've never been here before and you find yourself wondering, from your seat inside the big top, how a circus can have soul. You understand soul food, with its staples of greens and sweet potatoes, and soul music, such as Aretha Franklin singing "Respect." You understand when somebody says, "You got soul," and you pump your fist into a black pride salute.

But soul and circus is not a concept you have confronted.

Then the show opens with the Double Dribble and the Slam Dunk All-Stars flying toward a basketball hoop, ball in hand, soaring like players in the NBA but more dramatically. Short men and tall men. A man in dreads and blue tennis shoes runs, dives through a huge ring of fire, flips, and -- Bam! -- slams the ball through the hoop.

You begin to get it.

"What is the trick?" Killeon Miller, one of the slam dunk stars, says later. "Don't get burned."

The UniverSoul Circus, headquartered in Atlanta, was founded in 1994 by Cedric Walker, a concert promoter who wanted to give black circus performers a chance to showcase black culture and talent. Its annual appearance here in Prince George's County is a rite of spring.

Inside the big top, Ringmaster Tone, whose official name is Anthony Luewellyn, 38, gets the crowd going:

"When I say big top, you say circus!"

The trained poodles take the ring, followed by a high-wire act.

A team of men from Africa and South America climb to a tightrope 25 feet in the air.