Headpiece Filled With Straw

Sports

The Change

By Tony Hoagland

The season turned like the page of a glossy fashion magazine.
In the park the daffodils came up
and in the parking lot, the new car models were on parade.

Sometimes I think that nothing really changes -

The young girls show the latest crop of tummies,
        and the new president proves that he's a dummy.

but remember the tennis match we watched that year?

Right before our eyes
some tough little European blonde
pitted against that big black girl from Alabama,
cornrowed hair and Zulu bangles on her arms,
some outrageous name like Vondella Aphrodite -

We were just walking past the lounge
      and got sucked in by the screen above the bar,
and pretty soon
we started to care about who won,

putting ourselves into each whacked return
as the volleys went back and forth and back
like some contest between
the old world and the new,

and you loved her complicated hair
and her to-hell-with-everybody stare,
and I,
         I couldn't help wanting
the white girl to come out on top,
because she was one of my kind, my tribe,
with her pale eyes and thin lips

and because the black girl was so big
and so black,
                           so unintimidated,

hitting the ball like she was driving the Emancipation Proclamation
down Abraham Lincoln's throat,
like she wasn't asking anyone's permission.

There are moments when history
passes you so close
                  you can smell its breath,
you can reach your hand out
                           and touch it on its flank,

and I don't watch all that much Masterpiece Theatre,
but I could feel the end of an era there

in front of those bleachers full of people
in their Sunday tennis-watching clothes

as that black girl wore down her opponent
then kicked her ass good
then thumped her once more for good measure

and stood up on the red clay court
holding her racket over her head like a guitar.

And the little pink judge
                 had to climb up on a box
to put the ribbon on her neck,
still managing to smile into the camera flash,
even though everything was changing

and in fact, everything had already changed -

Poof, remember? It was the twentieth century almost gone,
we were there,

and when we went to put it back where it belonged,
it was past us
and we were changed

 

From What Narcissism Means to Me © Graywolf Press.

Link: The Writer's Almanac from American Public Media.

TUESDAY, 11 JANUARY, 2005
Listen (RealAudio) | How to listen

Well, It's my new home, anyway

Garrison Keillor read this poem today on The Writer's Almanac, and I just had to hang on to it. I'm a new to the city and loving it, and you can still feel that love in the poem below.

Link: Random House | Books | The Second Child by Deborah Garrison.

Goodbye, New York

(song from the wrong side of the Hudson)

By  Deborah Garrison

You were the big fat city we called hometown
You were the lyrics I sang but never wrote down
You were the lively graves by the highway in Queens
the bodega where I bought black beans
stacks of the Times we never read
nights we never went to bed
the radio jazz, the doughnut cart
the dogs off their leashes in Tompkins Square Park
You were the tiny brass mailbox key
the joy of “us” and the sorrow of “me”
You were the balcony bar in Grand Central Station
the blunt commuters and their destination
the post-wedding blintzes at 4 a.m.
and the pregnant waitress we never saw again
You were the pickles, you were the jar
You were the prizefight we watched in a bar
the sloppy kiss in the basement at Nell’s
the occasional truth that the fortune cookie tells
Sinatra still swinging at Radio City
You were ugly and gorgeous but never pretty
always the question, never the answer
the difficult poet, the aging dancer
the call I made from a corner phone
to a friend in need, who wasn’t at home
the fireworks we watched from a tenement roof
the brash allegations and the lack of any proof
my skyline, my byline, my buzzer and door
now you’re the dream we lived before

Humor for the holiday: Jewish Haiku

No offense is meant in posting the poems below, which were forwarded to me with no authorship noted, by a friend. The spirit feels to me lighthearted and fun. If anyone is offended, I welcome and respect your comments below.

  Lacking fins or tail

  the gefilte fish swims with

  great difficulty.

  *****

  Beyond Valium,

  peace is knowing one's child

  is an internist.

  *****

  On Passover we

  opened door for Elijah.

  Now our cat is gone.

  *****

  After the warm rain

  the sweet smell of camellias.

  Did you wipe your feet?

  *****

  Her lips near my ear,

  Aunt Sadie whispers the name

  of her friend's disease.

  *****

  Today I am a man.

  Tomorrow I will return

  to the seventh grade.

  *****

  The sparkling blue sea

  reminds me to wait an hour

  after my sandwich.

  *****

  Like a bonsai tree,

  is your terrible posture

  at my dinner table.

  *****

  Jews on safari --

  map, compass, elephant gun,

  hard sucking candies.

  *****

  The same kimono

  the top geishas are wearing:

  I got it at Loehmann's.

  *****

  Mom, please! There is no

  need to put that dinner roll

  in your pocketbook.

  *****

  Seven-foot Jews in

  the NBA slam-dunking!

  My alarm clock rings.

  *****

  Sorry I'm not home

  to take your call. At the tone

  please state your bad news.

  *****

  Is one Nobel Prize

  so much to ask from a child

  after all I've done?

  *****

  Today, mild shvitzing.

  Tomorrow, so hot you'll plotz.

  Five-day forecast: feh

  *****

  Yenta. Shmeer. Gevalt.

  Shlemiel. Shlimazl. Meshuganah

  Oy! To be fluent!

  *****

  Quietly murmured

  at Saturday Synagogue services,

  Yanks 5, Red Sox 3.

  *****

  Hard to tell under the lights.

  White Yarmulke or

  male-pattern baldness