We should legit organize our own Celebrity Softball Game.
Play another Poetry Site
Or Intramural.
Show America a different side
of stardom.
Rent a sandlot.
Wolf starting pitcher,
Soul starting catcher.
Eliot umpires.
Everyone gets an At bat.
Instead of hating on each other,
Play together as a Team.

Being the only one awake in the back seat, or the only one thinking loudly,
and in the back of  your mind, sitting there like living weight, you've got
the giant Citgo sign
(you swear you could fit in the T),
listening to passion pit as the golden sun flings itself on the highway,
a construction worker lowering his pants in front of a dumpster,
hearing the sandlot play downstairs as you stare at the dark ceiling,
pizza you ate in the park the evening before now being had for breakfast,
finding out the **** is pro-choice,
getting your shoulder squeezed on a rollercoaster
by a boy who screams like a girl,         
feeling drunk even though you're sober,
running through the dark,
passing trailers with round lanterns lining the tops,
outlining shirtless men and smoking women,
looking in the mirror after swimming with your clothes on
in a hot tub,
and you're not sure if you're
beautiful
or
disgusting.
Yeah, you can sleep now.

Detroit
Lying in ruins like Ancient Rome
The gods of Detroit looking down
Ford wondering
Why cars are now made in china  
Ty Cobb sobbing
Over the loss of his sandlot
Diego Rivera
Putting his hand down saying
Don't touch my **** mural
Eminem's eight mile vanishing
Joe Louis' palace tumbling down
Bell Isle being sold to the highest bidder
Who killed Detroit?
Let the finger pointing begin

There's a room somewhere,
locked fast behind an unassuming door
looming grey-brown at the end of a
misshapen corridor.

Inside, the relics of a time lost in time
to time.

A mitt, engraved with the counterfeit signature
of a ballplayer whose name once rang a bell,
smelling of adolescent sweat,
still dusted with sandlot crumbs,
a reminder of those ground *****
that sped by too fast to field,
those fly ***** just out of reach,
suspended in a June twilight
lost to time.

Ribbons and awards and certificates,
signed by leaders of puny regimes
paved and repaved over,
proof of a world before this,
an era of (now) perceived achievement,
legitimized, glorified by Old English type
printed on recyclable stock paper.

Ticket stubs from blockbuster flops,
receipts of a linear plotline:
Drama, comedy, a budding romance -
Temporarily amusing on such a spacious screen
but ultimately unfulfilling;
the plot peters towards the end.

Lost in time the boy cries out
with no one left to answer but the man
who, as quietly as he entered it,
exits the room,
as always, leaving the door just ajar,
enough to muffle the shrieks of a little boy
chasing an invisible horizon.

Go outside after breakfast
Come back for lunch at noon.
Come inside at suppertime
And even then, it was too soon.
Never permitted to be late
We ate dinner at six each day
Eat every bite on our plate.
About the menu we had no say.

We had baking soda submarines
Popular Mechanics magazines
And that was technology back then.
Decoder rings and roller skate keys
Shooting marbles on our knees
And playing crooks and G-men.

Those days we had three channels
On all black and white televisions.
Just the same thirteen inch boxes;
Nothing like 3D or Panavision.
Loved Uncle Miltie and Lucille Ball
And considered Korla Pandit a waste,
But we must be forgiven because
Back then, no one had much taste.

We could spell Kula, Fran and Ollie,
Said words like “gosh”, and “by golly”
And were anxious to see flying cars.
Many movies were in Technicolor
But you always had to take your brother
And he didn’t recognize the stars.

After school we played sandlot ball
Saturday were TV cartoon shows;
Dancing trees with belly buttons
And a local clown with a red nose.
We joined Cubs and Boy Scouts
Had lemonade stands by the street,
Matchbooks in bicycle stokes
And used bottle cap taps for our feet.

It seemed like days were longer then
And summer was slow to come again.
Those were the days when we had fun.
We built our forts and hooked up swings
Kids did all crazy kinds of things
Before these modern times had begun.

A three foot stick to smash up the brick
A Ten pound weight to seal their fate
Fault hearts are just but nails on my plate
"Call me 'sledgehammer'.......you will see my strength"
Swing fast unto forth,
Filter liquids that linger in quarts.......
Did that repetitive swing bust your torque?
Tell me not it was him,
Whom I believed to be was my only friend!
Sledgehammer was it not?
Sledgehammer whom hit the right spot?
Did he come to destroy sandlot?
Please oh lord please tell me not......
For I know naught
But god oh please tell me sledgehammer did not!
He whom hurt you with implicit demand for strength
Steal your mighty molded ranks
You gave him power and sealed your fates
Call him Sledgehammer
"I'm here to forever hammer your fates!"

Eyelash blinkered in hubris Rubik’s knight
Elevation of pogrom ennobled by triaged triumph minus the cynic summation of all light
Littoral swank bronzed like starlet fantasia with a Carey mountaintop jeer
Reichstag extinguished blaring sirens of cacophony capers to benumbed Linkin Park cheer
Knells intrepid by quakes of remonstrance staged in histrionic applause
Southern Colonies shifting in Charleston surgical in orderly slugabed dogged laws
Slipshod through ribbacles of rengall zenkidu among the sertivine poison ivy
Grimace at gamboled rivulets of a moribund Vanilla Sky for departed wiseacres of savvy dicey ICE toxic Harvey Dent slimy
A mannequin Marx Ralph alienated the truest alien by pioneering disdain of a hostage giraffe summiting a Swiss Alp
Master of time 12th bradycardia for Generator design parked beneath escarpments of base aphasia milquetoast in killjoy Strickland nickels away from a gubbertushed mouth
LOST legend enunciating the furor of epochs of egalitarian traipse
Trapped by the bootlick of a wrinkle of Van Winkle revolutionary agape
Curved by soliliquy master of belletrist prose
The vogue can’t help but bunt, balk, denounce the remembrance of Lady Madonna pose
We beat the muckrakers of rummaged lisp of culinary suns that the sons of privilege are emoluments to apolaustic zeal first known to transmogrified nuns, before the poppies made the few into many and the notion of an insuperable line of infinity into a spherical nullification of the concept of none
Estrapade engorges the fustilug magnet of the kitsch Kenosha Chicago Demolition drive-by-derbies “once read”
That two kings one Titanic by skin-color dashed dreams the other both the coins of tails eloped with heady dreams of head
Sacrifice shadow dancing with pettifoggery in slumps of aboriginal dances of marsupial rice
Native to extortion gouged blind as Samson exacts lachrymose cremations of Pikes Peak trick-or-treat aghast with fright
Temples raised in 46 years cemented never in the Mumbo Jumbo politics of those lacking the oceanic schadenfreude among queers
That by their exclusion the panmixia of fluid alchemy is dauntless scrabble limited by NORAD notions of Tears for Fears
Henpecked rooster awakens the serfdom of Ronald’s (sly spy) Drugs sailing with dovetails of elapse downtrodden in modern clubs
Drunken *** addict sell-out charlatans berated  by Ingram Angles sent by maleficence are the grubhub of Harriet Tubman torching promising tapestries with rugged rugs
Slinging the bait of fish-hook dimples on freckled effigies of ****** humiliation outmantled by Mickey weight
I thunder a fulgurant explosion against recrimination of white-collar criminals that philander saturnalia in pretense with facetious swarpollock freight
Crooks of tyranny exhort the paranoiacs of indemnity to sunken canned soup applause of a Warhol extortion
Berating my audience with drooling slavers of inelegant tortoise byzantine like an Istanbul dredged with intortion
Mr Deeds is not a champion of BRE Properties nor the pinnacles of inertia, a psychiatric squeeze
My orange juice is not a car chase against treecheese in terminal punitive disease
Soaring with the prosperous tongue against the walloped nativism of pounced impounds having too much fun
I let the other guardians of the order of salvation pivot vitriol in loaded dice against Orangutans of Swedish minted gum
Caesar died for the seizure of Anglican pride of a namesake percolating millenia for Brutus in the Washington Bullets of a conquered Ottawa on strike carnal with Chauvinism in regional divide
Never has there been a more hollow trope than the agency of deep state defamation of a scurrilous backbite of gnashing pride
Lost to pollster tricks of acquiescence and caricatures of a menacing personage Swift on the Riff but never the snarling Menace of a Blondie Biff
I tower above the anthills of conformity of luxury in Jamaican Bob Sled Teams testing the curiosity of enlightened “What Ifs”
Canada Dry for striking people enthused by Rye abides in the memory of reform that skulks the skunks that make every Scudworth cry
Because a Dental Dam damsel living in streets of peril fascinated by distance is the contortion of entreaty in the pasquinade of attempts at American Pie
May the city of a figurative crucifixion burn with the irony of a thousand suns as Wendy’s burgers unload on prejudice with albatrosses of winsome puns
Fixed data interpolated by convenient lies of serial killers who aim for blue skies shanked in Oswald infamy for the imposture of any flashbang revenge against cinematic guns
I blacklist the Zemeckis villainy as a trudge of travesty
Hedged lies blinkered by Batman and Robin puns redeemed by Dinosaurs of Amnesty
Obviously belittled by futures etched by a more honest infinity
Because 88 keys are not a stroke because the infinite bees know the parlance of divinity
Invited lissome taxidermies of Capone against teetotalers of parvanimity of vainglory overthrown
Showers the honest hominist reckoning of a world where neither crudity of know-nothing radical polarization owns every inept baritone
Crusading a secular war because the gubbertushed eccedentesiast spinsters of Santa Cruz deserve a gassy overtone
Torch the SC Pacific Avenue for peace
Let the world unite behind a singularity with purpose in ventilation of Speedman’s release
That antithetical Jacks of many names are wed with the progeny of enduring lists of NSA protection rather than rentgourge Denver PD eager to chaos decimated by the decimals of a region forever boycott and impeached
To the decisive curling of the frolicked Abandoned Pool servitude crass disasters are the sheol of impudent flagrant overreach
Regnant on the turmoil of invented throne
I scowl at the chicanery of Capone’s Chicago sweltering with Kenosha infamy tossing contortionist strippers a vulcanized bone in a DIA Diamond that even 11,500 years of knowledge is surpassed in condemnation of screaming E.T. calling the right home
Speak Now because the reach of forever is God appeased not by a kowtow but a mobilized ambition for Why? When? And How?
History will remember gentility as the kind steward rather than a Disco Demolition Derby of urbacity venerating a seasonal Golden Cow
Hipsters flock with folly to South African extortion for freebooters who bootlick the aceldama of war against the sublime currency of a winner surrounded by thugs
TOO MANY URBAN KIDS ARE TAUGHT BY REDUCTIVE TAUTOLOGY TO HATE The United States of America RATHER THAN NURTURING SYNCRETISM IN PATRIOTIC HUGS
Imperfect in design with disagreement in plainest sight
Sometimes libertarianism with a Democratic twinge is clearly in the right that should believe in reform even when the footloose girouettism is too tight
Yet forestalled for authentic grit the grisly rentgourge of venal abysses knows the countermand against Rand with hyperboles of the clearest *******
The true flock congregates around scepters built not with militant graft but a promenade of sultry dance for the defiant C.L.I.T.
Exercise with the Rock knowing school buses of dogmatism inferior are distraught
Dying dogmatism is a peacock of industry the yeggs can easily unlock rather than truckle with truculent Scottish Rites tasty with Connery Scotch
Defenders of the misleading staircase because of the carapace of Hovering pertinacity easily won and bought
Neither scary nor deliberate streets are rumpus of elevations of unbounded anarchy considerate but robbed by the illiterate
That the delegated mansion will be robbed by the cooperation of the remorseful idiot recognizing his snide mendaciloquence in destructive Roswell Records limerick
Scowls are on petrol and patrol hoping Tesla is a short of bravado too intrepid to sanction free-for-all profligacy in alleys that bowl
To the Emerald Street lie of hypes of perdition rather than merely a seasonal token embarrassment coal
The fossilized future is the irrevocable past because more respect is needed than the ***** of a maskirovka caste
Diamond Lightning in Bhagavad Gita prancing with the delusion of the everlasting mummification of Brawndo ash
Dinner with Egyptsy malingers on tomes etched flippant in integrity and all about the curated snare of kitsch cash
The cache valley of LASER tag shattered like Joseph Smith flagellating the confederate hayday with articulate gnash
Fast & Furious the amused by Suburban subway know the trailblazer trashes of The Stupids’ being Einstein about Boogie Dubs rather rash
Streaking through a Tucker rule the Buccaneers live for the SoulSeek of a riddled ruler benighted of prerogative of Roger Goodell bumping in his Ferrari the tucked serenade of Tool
Wrong band because they linger in the shadow dancing backpages of scandals of Norweigan hourglasses of shameful hush hush Vikings mining furloughs of pulverized anticipation sand
Humbled retinue shelves the ossified limpid droll drool
As the haze of submarines scouting pridefall galls of indolence betraying innocence becomes moral cigarettes of Menthol Kool
Reparations for chappy chapstick games of bowery riches
The urbane needs to read, discern and maneuver against whiplash found in Navi witches
Swapping homes with crack addict legalese an *** to a bronzed party crackling with cackles Home Alone
Knows a toiletry of escape gullible like Seahawks wishing they could contain a fumbled season by Mahomes
Jones methamphetamine paranoiac manure desiccated by folksy homilies of brimstone cremation deserts his flock to abide by a flagging wayward temptress
Decimated by the agency of time his Austin crenellation flounders in grimace of the untimely swoon his covert empress
Blinded by the light of darkness in subversion
Excoriated for the deeds of his permission to demote commotion into only an acquiescent dance with barbed etch-a-sketch conclusion- a half-baked *******
Quacksalver poetaster wrinkled with hatred simpering paranoia strangled by Hendrix abeyance of turgid delusion
Lurid underground Princeton gilds infested with defected dementia in cozens in the fritty of heralded mistress SHE appointed
Sandlot ravens cloistered the bravado of thirst for chosen words scrappy in clawed henpecks the pointless illegal sanctioned to brusque witticism anointed
Lamps of pathway sparkle with coruscated stargazer Winslet dreamy swank illustrious by providence
Engrenage of delopes of pettifoggery identity staggers the woozy dismal day of disjointed wounds on Native sons Denver can’t damage in a lonely campaign for the prodigal bends of Overlook Lorraine Motel bent
Intrepid in gallantry I swoop the scrivello tusked with might
Penetrating the vivid dreams of the serenade of alpenglow daylight
That love might rule over chance and probability above the specter of dynasty prodigy progeny tithing gravity in rent
Yet this taper of majestic poise will outfox even the careless gambles of the prodigal son Mr Sender already traipsed conquered and went
The mountaintop is so clear from the cloister of authenticity drinking Eminence Front of the WHO rather than the coherence of the near
Because titans shepherd the good flock without insult and not quavering with insuperable time flackey with tremulous fear
I dare this day to outlast benighted ignorance of the narrow gate of a persecution tsunami on a Lisbon tear
Because galloping ahead of the internecine sheds the serpentine craft of 3:1 Genesis met with the worst fleeced fleer
Not auctioned off like ******* vogue to the disfavor of poor taste
I am the true Royal Flush that can always count on the aced basic but mostly acidic flourish of a jest in bass predicated on the basis for Mozart pH
Today could be the summit of acclimated prodigy in startled degrees temerity could never bet against
Because you better bet the Bros and Cos of civilization are skilled in ostentation of Sterling Pound defense
Never offensive to the liturgy of triumph beckoning an apocalypse now tentative memory on a Manifest Destiny frontier rarely on wickers of extinguished cattle ranchers knowing the gamut of acumen to defend a fortress with the best fencing James Bond could dispense
Now is either a cordial joke of a flagrant anarchy balking at destiny
Or the sunrise majesty of the twelve tribes and beyond defeating the stingy bees of infamy
Your choice doesn’t defeat my voice
But your action heralds my loyalty with a triumphant Victoria of an age not for agelast geeks intimidated but living clairvoyance with fidelity to the right choice for the right time to swim in elegant rejoice
(1977 Words)

It is like shaking hands with a bag of oyster crackers;
Joints sprained, ligaments torn, fingers fractured
And splayed off in several different directions
Like a weathervane that has had a rather nasty shock, indeed,
The whorls of his fingertips, the uneven rise and fall of the knuckles
Serving as a travelogue of a lifetime spent
In towns not quite ready for the big time:
Olean, Oneonta, Visalia, Valdosta, a dozen more besides,
A million miles on buses
Of uncertain vintage and roadworthiness.
Each scar and swelling, each uneven path
Between base and fingertip has a tale of its own;
The ring finger on the left hand first broken
By a Big Bob Veale fastball that was supposed to be a curve,
Later snapped again by Steve Dalkowski,
Who, drinking quite a bit by then
(When ol’ Steve had put away a few, he notes ruefully,
You didn’t want to hit him, catch him,
Or sit in the first few rows behind the plate)
Most likely never saw the sign
Indicating slider instead of high heat.
The index finger on his throwing hand?  
Well, that was from a foul tip in…Wellsville in ’59?  Walla Walla in ’62?
When you’ve bit up by the ball as many times as I have,
You tend to forget what you tore up when.
Ah, but no such problem with the right pinkie;
That was snapped one cold April night
Somewhere between Winnipeg and Duluth,
During a poker game when a backup infielder
Produced an unexpected and wholly inexplicable king
Seemingly from nowhere.

But those hands!  They were, in the lexicon of the scouts
(The same ones who labeled him
With the dreaded tag of “good field, no hit”)
Who trolled the sandlot parks
And high school fields of his childhood, “soft”;
Indeed, he could cradle a ninety-mile-an-hour fastball like an infant,
And, with the gentlest and most imperceptible of movements,
Turn the wildness of a nineteen-year-old phenom
Into an inning-ending third strike, and even now,
Two decades of bad lighting and jury-rigged equipment
Having turned the topography of his digits craggy and asymmetrical,
They seem as smooth and supple as they were at nineteen,
With all the strength and unsullied smoothness of youth,
As he grips and waggles an unseen bat
In the course of retelling
(In his one brief, glorious spring in camp with the big club)
How he doubled to the gap in right-center
Off none other than the great Whitey Ford himself.

In summer in the country
the married buzzards wheel and flow
on languid wings,
surveilling every inch of the earth below
for unwary prey.

The sun tracks dawn to night
over heat scorched land,
ripening the grains and drying the hay,
whilst in dense city living,
the park tree-leaves rustle
in summer symphony and
sandlot infants scream and play,
their mothers watching every move,
no suntime siesta now and here.

And in dense packed city blocks
mi casa es non su casa,
open windows leak sound,
and the smell of someone’s mother’s cooking
is treif at another table.
In grander houses the front lawns
now water-lack died-back brown,
evidence of greener days gone past,
wait for the fall's forgiving.

And yet and still
in the mellow evenings
neighbors talk to neighbors
friendly asides,
jokes,
politesses,
the leavenings
that let us live together
till the cool comes
and the windows and the doors shut.
We too hibernate till spring.

Running the fine hairs against my palms,
The cold wooden, slick wooden, handle,
Wondering which tree was this tool born from,
Vast colors on every single pallet,
A simple two syllable word,
Could not desribe their rich beauty,
My shaken hand guiding,
The straight and steady paint brush,
Lines lines lines lines,
Dark and light and dark and light,
A swirl of emotions on a piece of paper,
Heart racing,
Mind wandering,
Wanderlust,
Or just lost,
Not enough color,
Not enough shapes,
Swirls and spirals,
Like spirits in the sky,
Aluminous beauty,
Sprites dancing under mother Luna,
A shabby shacked city,
Full of sleeping children,
Or maybe star crossed lovers,
Maybe the kids from sandlot,
Cause they never really grew up,
Maybe heaven or hell,
But it's beautiful,
And I made it,
I drownd the paint brush,
Into the blackish blueish pool of water,
Swirling,
My finger tips dip into the paint,
Cold and calming,
Like a ghost of a friend,
I use to know,
Smearing the masterpiece into exiestence.

Die
Because the world
Why?
Because the world can't allow it
                           Now

I see color
In the darkest
And I know life and love
I see generations
Heard stories
Felt death

Live
And words
Live
And life
Live
And money
Live
And all conniving interest yell
Live

And fight

Tomorrow
In some forsaken sandlot
In some unforgiving parking lot
In some hell
I'll find heaven
In death

Live

Because tomorrow's brighter sun
Found a cloud
And only one way.around

Live

It is like shaking hands with a bag of oyster crackers;
Joints sprained, ligaments torn, fingers fractured
And splayed off in several different directions
Like a weathervane that has had a rather nasty shock, indeed,
The whorls of his fingertips, the uneven rise and fall of the knuckles
Serving as a travelogue of a lifetime spent
In towns not quite ready for the big time:
Olean, Oneonta, Visalia, Valdosta, a dozen more besides,
A million miles on buses
Of uncertain vintage and roadworthiness.
Each scar and swelling, each uneven path
Between base and fingertip has a tale of its own;
The ring finger on the left hand first broken
By a Big Bob Veale fastball that was supposed to be a curve,
Later snapped again by Steve Dalkowski,
Who, drinking quite a bit by then,
(When ol’ Steve had put away a few, he notes ruefully,
You didn’t want to hit him, catch him,
Or sit in the first few rows behind the plate)
Most likely never saw the sign
Indicating slider instead of high heat.
The index finger on his throwing hand?  
Well, that was from a foul tip in…Wellsville in ’59?  Walla Walla in ’62?
When you’ve bit up by the ball as many times as I have,
You tend to forget what you tore up when.
Ah, but no such problem with the right pinkie;
That was snapped one cold April night
Somewhere between Winnipeg and Duluth,
During a poker game when a backup infielder
Produced an unexpected and wholly inexplicable king
Seemingly from nowhere.

But those hands!  They were, in the lexicon of the scouts
(The same ones who labeled him
With the dreaded tag of “good field, no hit”)
Who trolled the sandlot parks
And high school fields of his childhood, “soft”;
Indeed, he could cradle a ninety-mile-an-hour fastball like an infant,
And, with the gentlest and most imperceptible of movements,
Turn the wildness of a nineteen-year-old phenom
Into an inning-ending third strike, and even now,
Two decades of bad lighting and jury-rigged equipment
Having turned the topography of his digits craggy and asymmetrical,
They seem as smooth and supple as they were at nineteen,
With all the strength and unsullied smoothness of youth,
As he grips and waggles an unseen bat
In the course of retelling
(In his one brief, glorious spring in camp with the big club)
How he doubled to the gap in right-center
Off none other than the great Whitey Ford himself.