Poetry Assignment: Baseball

Here is a link to another baseball poem which I kind of like better than this one, but since it's from before, I couldn't use it again...


Winter Park

The empty cathedral stands silent
But for the whispers of the stands
Where sun worshipers roast like brats
In the hazy, hot summer sun.
But that day is not today, not today.

Now the ground is cold, so cold.
From beneath a cracked bench
Tucked way back in the dugout
A baseball peeks out, a shy small
Mouse on a frosty winter's day.

Forlorn but not quite forgotten little ball
Recalls the days of the sun and the grass
The swing of the bat, the joy of the sound
As contact is made. The roar of the crowd,
Silenced for now, but old ball knows it will be back.

The wind whistles through empty flagpoles,
Their banners long ago removed.
Rope and cable tap out a rhythm without rhythm.
The bleachers below slumber soundly beneath
Snow and ice, waiting, dreaming of sunshine days.

The sun hangs so low at mid-day
Shadows stretch deep into the outfield.
A snow thick and lustrous carpets
The field where birds peck and poke,
Wandering in search of old popcorn.

One day, one day the field will awaken
The sun will rise higher and brighter than now
The bleachers will fill with the sun seeking
Throng. But today, on this cold day
The park slumbers, waiting for then.