Each year, before the first spring training game, the late Hall of Fame Tigers broadcaster Ernie Harwell would read these verses from the Song of Solomon (2: 11-12).
Life is Good, reprise
by James Finn Garner
Winter’s been raw as a campout in Banff.
Your new basement walls are moldy and damp.
Your drapes caught fire from a knocked-over lamp—
. Relax!
. Pitchers and catchers are reporting to camp.
Your check-writing hand’s developed a cramp,
Your bills are all due and you ain’t got a stamp,
Creditors cling to your neck like a clamp—
. Smile!
. Pitchers and catchers are reporting to camp.
Your yard is now split by a new freeway ramp.
Your son is engaged to a gold-digging tramp.
Your “guitar hero” neighbor’s just bought a new amp—
. Life is good!
. Pitchers and catchers are reporting to camp.
winter
by Van
When I was young, in the ’60s,
baseball was a snore in the winter.
I used to take my grass-stained bat
to bed with me,
and smell summer ’til I slumbered.
Other times I’d take my glove
to bed when the smell of oiled horse hide
lead to dreams of heroic runs for a fly ball.
60 years later,
the internet has replaced
my baseball gear late into the night.
Now, there’s free agency to speculate into exhaustion.
Who will sign where?
Why?
For how much?
Which teams are selling?
Who’s buying who?
What will your team look like next year?
Who’s going to greener grass?
Who’s loyal to their fan base?
Now, I’m old enough for my 2nd childhood,
I might wander the aisles of a thrift Store,
seek out an old glove to sleep with,
and see if dreams of dreams come back to me.
But I can already tell that metal bats don’t carry
the allure of grass stains on ash.
The Post-Season
by Paul Smith
We started out fresh
in April
with a new ball
a ‘league’ ball
we called it
ivory colored
smooth
round
red stitching
we couldn’t get our nails
under
games went till dark
innings uncounted
till an dispute ended
them
or a lost ball
it survived
mud, dust, the smell
of gutters
disappearance in the hedge
or was it a jinx
by mid-July
it wore the unlucky face
of a sharecropper
a face lined with betrayal
fighting a losing war
with time and rain
by late September
embalmed with electrician’s tape
soggy, half-dead
lopsided
an oblate spheroid
it welcomed last rites
on that cellar shelf
as another cockeyed
semi-round object
took its place
not cowhide
but pigskin
World Series Haiku
by Gary Gillette
Fightin’ Phils busted.
Space Cowboys’ Orange becomes
Twenty-two’s New Green.