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2022 Academy of American Poets Prize

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A Brief History of Time in Left Field

by M. G. Moscato

 

1A Brief History of Time in Left FieldI have seen the aurora borealis behind my eyelids the pitcher-mystic muses. Muses to confused reporter whose beats demand marquee quotes on infinite loop as political sport. Sport entertainment programming loves any horse in the race no matter what carrot adrift when studio interviews reduce soundbites. Soundbites abridge all nuance, all metaphysical concerns cut except astrophysics. Re: the stars. Their half-lives, whether dense batters or bright hurlers. They radiate across billions. Light years on a field of play. Until of coursethey—Don’t celestial bodies emit climbing ERAs? Too many errorsfor carpet-furrowed turf or cratered fescue-scapeswhere every tossed orb holds rogue potential to spray, dribble, bounce. Tip foul or soar. Just about anywhere in the chaos-glittering. Cosmos being the biggest, battiest darn ballpark. Whose vacuum abhors nature’s multitudinous roar? What city’s minglingraces and culturesacorporate jumbotron would just as soon stomp. Assimilate, hush into hotdogs for price of admission. It’s not green-eyed or green-walled. Not like Fenway’s left-field monster. It works in unmysterious ways with names that read eminent domain. Runs over Mexican-Americans. Forgets Chavez Ravine after local ostentations or federal funds intended to develop housing when housing meant stadium. Meant a city of angels put a roof over the head of millionaire Walter O’Malley. His Brooklyn Dodgers newly relocated. California, sun-spoilt. Where so many diamonds per capita once outshone the intergalactic night league. Even these are fatedforcollapsewhen black holes love loss as much as light. Which bringsa kind of terrible. Beauty. Please rise to see how it lies: a long, bruised line. Drive—into horizon. Through infield gap and into the mauve, dead star cloud. Root for it. Whatever home team. Any cause. See how it floats, spins in the pitted core of the unknown. Knows little of box seats. Nothing of clocks.

 

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