by Michael X. Ferraro
Maximum ducks upon the pond,
Clad in uniforms brown and blond,
Waddled home, four straight games,
Padres’ bats spewing flames.
Foes’ feathers’ ruffled? Tatis yawned.
Bert Shepard
by Michael Ceraolo
It was in a way because of politics
that I got to pitch in the majors,
though not from a quota system for amputees
I had been returned stateside
in a prisoner exchange in early ’45,
and when I was in Washington
getting fitted for a new lower leg,
I was visited by someone high up in the War Department
I told him my desire was to play baseball
and he mentioned me to Mr. Griffith,
who let me come to camp and be part of the team
Being a lefty, I was fortunate
that it was my lower right leg that was gone;
had it been the left the dream would have been gone also
I know I was kept around mostly as a morale booster
for those in similar situations as mine,
and to pitch batting practice and exhibition games
I did get into one real game and pitched well,
which tells you about the quality of wartime ball,
since I wasn’t very good before the war
with two full legs (too wild),
and I wasn’t very good after the war
with one-and-a-half legs (still too wild)
Yet, as much of a thrill as it was
to pitch in a major-league game,
I’d have to say my greatest thrill
was meeting, almost fifty years later,
the German Army doctor who saved my life
Quatrophenia
by Hilary Barta
The White Sox tagged four in a row
That’s one plus three more, dont’cha know
Four homers, of course
Were hit with such force
They smite blow, blow, blow after blow!
100-Year Anniversary
by Stephen Jones
Too much to say, briefly,
About the Negro Leagues
And 100-year anniversary,
But one word,
One word of history –
Like a diamond legacy,
Despite past society –
Is a jewel
In the field of green dreams:
Empowerment.
The Wrigleyville Monkey’s Paw
Fiction by James Finn Garner
A stranger approaches a Cub fan in a bar, carrying a strange relic….
I was sitting at the bar at Yak-zie’s on Clark. The season hadn’t started yet, so the place was nice and peaceful, full of locals. The expectations, the intensity, the slobbery emotions of the regular season were still off in the distance, so I was soaking in the serenity of things that currently were and the things that could in the future be. In short, I enjoyed being near my favorite ballpark with a cold one in my hand, without having to share the place with hordes of drunk account managers from River North and Schaumburg.
I was just about to ask for my tab when a certain smell stung the air, a smell like the floor of the Grand Avenue Red Line station. I turned to my left and was confronted with a haunted face staring intently at me. The man wasn’t a bum, but he wasn’t quite normal either. His scraggly beard was dusted with gray, and his full head of hair was slicked back. His eyes were brown and lit from the inside, surrounded by cracked circles of skin like pale dried mud.
Hey, I said.
You need to do me a favor, he said.
Sure I do.
You do.
Well, you have such a sweet way of asking someone, I said, how could anyone refuse?
Don’t laugh. This isn’t a joke.