Sports for Sunday Scribblings

I wrote this one during journal writing with my British Literature students the day after: Thursday 10/28/04
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Red Sox Sweep St. Louis Cardinals to Win World Series

My husband was snoring
in his La Z Boy
when Johnny Damon
made his homerun.

My scream woke him
up and he grumbled
but smiled
before heading upstairs
to bed.

When I joined him
he was sleeping again
and it was the 3rd inning
and two more runs
had scored.

He woke up again
in time to see
the lunar eclipse
red brown and glowing

like the hope
that was blooming
slowly and scarily
in my chest
inning by
inning.

Even the moon
was too nervous
to look.

I sat in bed
with my sleeping
husband
alone
with the whole world
and a new moon
smiling
freed from
the shadow.

My Style for Suday Scribblings

“’That ain’t my style’ said Casey. ‘Strike one!’ the umpire said.”
~Ernest Lawrence Thayer


This is the first thing
that popped into my head
when I read the prompt
for this week.

I thought I’d be able
to whip up a poem
in no time at all.
Instead, I sit here

staring at the screen
thinking about teaching
“Casey at the Bat”
years ago to my eighth-

grade students
and reading it to my
high schoolers in October
2004 when it looked

like the Red Sox
could never beat
the Yankees.
But, tonight, it is letting

me down. No ideas
are percolating. No words
are marching down my arms.
I’m at bat, like Casey,

and the ball is coming
toward me but, “It ain’t
my style” so I don’t
even bother to try to hit it.