Baseball Days
Cicadas cast oblong shadows
on the hard-packed dirt
that counts as the road
leading up to the field
Old Man Grievy gifted the town
more than four decades ago,
its treeless expanse the sun-baked
home to baseball games
these summer evenings.
A breeze in this dry air
makes even the warmest days
bearable, as the Mom brigade
totes coolers full of Cokes
and bologna sandwiches
to this main event just past
the outskirts of legal city limits.
The Syler brothers hover
at the edge of the field,
often at the bottom of the third,
their cooler full of beer
hauled in from two counties over
just for nights like these.
Truck lights beam across home plate
as dusk blinks out the sunshine,
all radios tuned to the fuzzy sounds
of a country station filling in the spaces
between the clack of wooden bats,
the hum of crickets, and the lonely hoot
of an owl on some distant hunt.
Armed with gossip and iced tea,
Rose Rayborn glides between the groups
of lawnchaired adults, hardly noting
the rugged play of mixed teams
just a few feet away from her. Rose
holds the truths of every player
to her chest like the treasure
of the child who left Mesquite Bend
more than a decade ago,
his baseball days tucked away
like the baby clothes Rose
has wrapped in tissue paper
in her hallway closet.
Ramona Levacy
April 11, 2015
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