Baseball Poem

Fifth Place Baseball in September

Because of drought and a few bad trades

the leaves have fallen too soon
and the crowd is sparse
and spaced like the remaining pieces

at the end of a long chess match
gridiron battle lines have been drawn

like grill marks across the brown diamond

 and the ball follows the fifty

high and toward right

till the sun strikes the fielder

like a peyton stiff arm

and you forgive random rookie

for his bad judgment

for all rookies must be forgiven

once in September
when fifth place is sewed up
and attendance is amazingly over a million.

           by Tim Peeler

      from “Touching All the Bases”

        with permission of the author.

 available at: www.mcfarlandpub.com