It is all about speed and flexibility, about speed

and flexibility and teamwork and accuracy.  We move

like neurons charging in your head, man,

choreography from the ground up,

meanwhile smelling the hot asphalt and exhaust,

the chainlink fence around the playground spinning

past the corner of our eye, with the traffic and storefronts,

what the ball feels like in our hands, hard, pebbled, orange

and black, what the dribble feels like,

the sound and pound, the sort of lope we adopt

getting on and off the court, the way somebody looks

when he starts to play, his face and his sneakers, it’s all part of it.

When we swivel it is a whiplash, when we pass it is a cannonball,

when we leap, we hang in the air like Nijinsky taking a nap,

when the ball goes in we slap each others’ shoulders and butts

then turn like a flock of barn swallows, you know our ancestors

were farmers, they had barns, they watched the birds

flying around in formation at sunset,

or a school of fish, you know the way fish dart

in unison, the way the tempo changes and they just bat off,

you can’t begin to guess how they do it.  You could say

we slosh like waves in a bathtub, back and forth,

and when we dunk one it feels good, but

the way we play it, there are no pauses in this game.

   after practice: right foot
to left foot, stepping forward and back, 
   to right foot and left foot,
and left foot up to his thigh, holding 
   it on his thigh as he twists
around in a circle, until it rolls 
   down the inside of his leg,
like a tickle of sweat, not catching 
   and tapping on the soft
side of his foot, and juggling
   once, twice, three times,
hopping on one foot like a jump-roper 
   in the gym, now trapping
and holding the ball in midair, 
   balancing it on the instep
of his weak left foot, stepping forward 
   and forward and back, then
lifting it overhead until it hangs there; 
   and squaring off his body,
he keeps the ball aloft with a nudge 
   of his neck, heading it
from side to side, softer and softer, 
   like a dying refrain,
until the ball, slowing, balances 
   itself on his hairline,
the hot sun and sweat filling his eyes 
   as he jiggles this way
and that, then flicking it up gently, 
   hunching his shoulders
and tilting his head back, he traps it 
   in the hollow of his neck,
and bending at the waist, sees his shadow, 
   his dangling T-shirt, the bent
blades of brown grass in summer heat; 
   and relaxing, the ball slipping
down his back . . . and missing his foot.

   He wheels around, he marches 
over the ball, as if it were a rock
   he stumbled into, and pressing
his left foot against it, he pushes it
   against the inside of his right 
until it pops into the air, is heeled
   over his head—the rainbow!—
and settles on his extended thigh before
   rolling over his knee and down 
his shin, so he can juggle it again
   from his left foot to his right foot
—and right foot to left foot to thigh—
   as he wanders, on the last day
of summer, around the empty field.

 No one lofts a loud out
             to the left field 

fencing with its ads
             for Meacham’s Auto

and McClintock Paints.
             There’s no bravado

at the plate at all.
             No southpaw deals

his slider for a strike
             no one appeals,

since no one lent
             the anthem her vibrato.

This afternoon the high,
             off-tune legato

in the stands was only
             wind on steel.

But even though the team’s
             due back in town

tomorrow evening,
             though a storm is spinning

this way now, and though
             the world’s beginning

to dissolve in dust purled
             off the mound,

a patience rallies
             as the dark spills down

another rapture
             into extra innings.