WS

yesterday
outside was the first real chill wind
it crept up and numbed my finger tips
over snapping novel pages
the sky was a reflection off sidewalk cement
and the brick red buildings on the square dulled
under its gaze
yesterday
those images crept into my heart
a man all in gray fell on the subway
refused all help
he rolled and his face reddened
yet he couldn't find the energy to regain his feet
he scowled at me and I hid behind my book
yesterday
a woman tall over 6 feet tall
dressed head to toe in gray with her friend beside
under 5 foot wearing brick red gray scarf
they walked away from me into other nights
across the wrong way streets
I averted my eyes
yesterday
each new vision brought misery
like I had gained the weight of winter
in gray somber snows
and brought them dragging from
stomach to bursting chest
to unravel like shoelaces at their expiration date
today
the Chicago Cubs won the World Series
dark voices screamed one hundred years of nothing
out into the night that was far away from their home
they were a happier gray than blue
even if nothing happy had changed
today
I am not really sure how I felt

A Baseball Poem

baseball was meant to be enjoyed on the radio like this
rippling across this ocean spirit we called America once
waves grow from wheat fields outside Kansas City
pick up antenna speed flush out against mountains east and west;

have a beer for me and slowly edge the volume up
it's the end of the 11th and this thing's got legs to go into the night;

Kansas City isn't Iowa it isn't heaven but it's sure close to both

March

25 days from 27
years, with children looking
up to daddy, job, meatloaf tuesdays
playground afterschool hurry home
from work, spring flowers in the air
hugging mommy,
and I'm so... old...so much older than
I should be when fathers will die after me
in the cold empty sad world of early mondays
coffee ford Taurus roaring like kittens
in the window as I leave, placing my foot
firmly between the door creaking shut
and outside--

I can't remember my fathers face when I was young
and he was towering above purple sky,
atheletic, throwing baseball back and forth
with old softball mit legendary,
I'd run my hands through it,
wonder at how it never missed,
he never missed,
holding his hand along mountain roads-

grass brushing cars silently,
I scraped my knee, blood and bruise
so we sat on old forgotten dug out bench,
grass above my waist,
watching the old ball game roll along
where my father was the hero
at 3rd and short,
bugs screeched loudly in the root jungle
cheering, in the hollow pocono heat

we've got miles back to walk
on the oh long ago road of childhood
and fatherhood,
where I forget to grow old
catching pop-ups
dad fires
higher than the sun

October childhood

There's so little to remember
of the summer
as the autumn air begins to sting
our breath and our memory,

My stomach lifted
back through time
by butterflies
and I'm 9 years old,
sitting against my father,
my new hat
pulled tight over my eyes,
blue with gold trim,
stiff and proud,
we're waiting on the pretend smells
of wood, dirt and leather,
the passage of time,
these 17 years,

still-
somehow-
wind circles that
long gone coliseum
with diagonal walkways
and crumbling concrete edifice,
left to history unkind,
and memories golden,

My father plants them like a seed,
a red, powder blue, blue, magenta seed,
it's like magic
and suffering,
and happiness,
and defeat,
and childhood,
and victory
and belief restored
promises kept
through a dream
and
it's October
and it's life.