Bulls Bard--The Verses
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Game 82

4/14/2016

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​CHI 115               PHI 105

When my dad died,
He stopped being the tormented crazy person
He was at the end,

And he got to be
All the things
He had been.

The book
Rather than the page.

Freed from the now.

There is a certain joy
In endings.

​Hoops Haiku
And until next year,
Drive home safely Chicago.
Beep beep,and goodnight.

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Game 81

4/12/2016

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​CHI 121               NO 116

Typically,
If they’re any good,
Kids go straight from the
Freshman team
To Varsity.

JV tends to be for storing
The other kids--

The ones who aren’t really players
But are still good kids.

And a lot of these
Other kids
See the writing on the wall
And eventually move on.

But some stick it out

And make it to
Senior year.

And the coach
Really has no choice
But to bump them up.

And depending how things go,
Some of them get on the court
And some of them look pretty good,
Like maybe they should have been here the whole time.

And that
Is the single
Most important lesson
Many kids
Can ever learn.
Hoops Haiku
The season over,
The game, for some strange reason,
Appears to go on.

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Game 80

4/10/2016

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​CHI 105               CLE 102

I am the two-thousand fifteen
Chicago Bulls

Of far too many things.

Talent isn’t the question--
Never has been.

Focus.
Drive.
Discipline.

​Doing the little things.

Playing
To the level
Of my (so called) competition.

Taking too long
Getting into my offense

And then settling
For isolations
And fadeaways.

Never quite getting how to stop
The pick and roll

Or to trust
The defense behind me.

Seeking contact
Over a good shot.

But I am the Bulls
In this way, too.

I am
Proud and
Strong.

And now add angry.

And I only have myself
To blame.

So I will spend this offseason in the gym--
Grinding.
And grinding.

And one day,

I will bring the championship
Back to Chicago.
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Game 79

4/8/2016

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​CHI 98               MIA 106

Bitter rivalries,
Looking back,
Taste sweet.

Time and memory
Are two old soldiers
Sitting in a saloon.

The war long over,
The battle matters more
Than the side.
Most kids talk tough.
Some even look good doing it.

Fool’s gold
Looks like gold.

But it’s not.
Lips break against teeth
Like the New Orleans levee.
​Blood in the water.
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Game 78

4/6/2016

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​CHI 92               MEM 108

In South Dakota
Near Mt. Rushmore
They are creating a monument
To Crazy Horse.

Have been
Since 1948.

Subtractive sculpture
Made from a mountain
With sticks of dynamite.

At midnight
On the Fourth of July
Explosions send rock tumbling
Heavily downward
Toward the pines.

Oohs and the aahs.

The clapping of white hands
And the flappity-fluttering
Of purple and green traveller’s checks.

Re-spect-acle.

A twenty-one gun salute
To a man shot out of the sky.

And one more rock
In the middle of nowhere.
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Game 77

4/4/2016

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​CHI 102               MIL 98

I used to go to Wrigley all the time.

It used to be
You could walk up
An hour before the game
And buy eight dollar
Bleacher seats.

Used to be.

Now, I must have seen
The Assholes--
I mean Astros--
Beat the Cubs
In person
At least twenty times.

One of those times
I made a promise
To man and god alike:

If I ever see Jeff Bagwell
Or Craig Biggio
Out in the world,
I swear to God:
I’m gonna punch ‘em in the face.

But here’s the thing:

Since that day,
I have seen Jeff Bagwell
Out in the world--

Twice.

The first time
I was at work--
Waiting tables
At a hipster hotspot
In Austin.

The second,
We were both sitting courtside
At a Bulls-Rockets game
In Houston.

Like ballers.

And I could easily use the situations
To explain away why I never punched him,
But the truth is
I just grew up.

Both times
I thought about approaching him.

I’m not exactly sure why--
Maybe to confess or something.

Or maybe just to acknowledge something.

Hey, Remember when we were kids
And swore we’d be enemies forever?

Well, the things
That I decided to feel forever
While learning who I was

Got packed up
And pushed behind
The things I feel now.

Like my boxes of old journals
And my dad’s tarot cards.

Time is funny.

But instead,
Like a grownup,
I just did my thing
And left the guy alone.

Anyway,
The Assholes--
Oops: Astros
Are in the
American League now anyway,

So who even really cares.
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Game 76

4/3/2016

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​CHI 90               DET 94

Every time a firefly lights
A magnolia flower begins to bloom.
-Uncle Dave
During halftime
My brother and I
Walked my baby daughter
Around the block
And saw our first firefly
Of the year.

I have been telling Magnolia
About fireflies
Her whole little life.

Making up songs
To coax her into sleep
As we do our ritual laps.

Fireflies were my first real proof
Of the existence of magic.

Soft grassy
Summertime sunsets
Promising mysterious night.

Soon the Magnolias
We pass on these walks
Will flower.

All white and pink and yellow,
Bringing their sweet
Lemony vanilla scent.

And the fireflies will dance across the grass,
Making the stars feel within our reach.

Change is in the air.
You and I,
underneath the magnolia tree.

Fireflies
dash around in the lemony breeze.

All my life
I’ve been dreaming this moment would be.

You and I,
underneath the magnolia tree.
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Game 75

4/1/2016

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CHI 103               HOU 100

It doesn’t really matter
How smart kids are,
If they aren’t consistent.

Follow through
Is what really matters.

Show up.
Do the work.
Every time.

Grind.

Even though
Whatever.

That’s what translates
To the world--

Especially now--
As we hit
The final stretch.
Some of my very favorite
Kids

Are in my
Least favorite class.

And it’s weird,
Because I like
All the kids
In that class.

It’s not like there’s some asshole
Ruining the whole thing.

It’s about engagement.
And taking the work
Seriously.

And about
The group
Being a group.

We just aren’t
Locking in
Like we need to.
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Game 74

3/30/2016

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​CHI 98               IND 96

Apples and water.

Exhausted,
Terrified,
And near starving,
The man
Left the boy
Sleeping
Alone
In the woods
With the pistol.

Dark,
Grey
World.

Everything
Burnt
And bleak
And broken.

Air
Thick with ash.
Eyes caked with it.

Grimey life.

The man
Chews a handful of
Hay dust.
And sets to
Gathering more
For the boy

And then
Like an Easter egg
Or afikomen--

Hidden at his feet
So he would find it,

Apples and water.

In times
Like these,
Small things
Get big.

And these
Are not
Small things.
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Game 73

3/29/2016

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​CHI 100               ATL 102

You ain't a crook , son. You just a shook one.
-The Infamous Mobb Deep
The baddest little kids
In the schoolyard

Are still just
Little-ass kids
On a playground.

Strong kids
Are kid-strong.

Muscles
Getting blood
From a heart
That doesn’t know
Shit.

And when grown folks roll up
And they know they’re busted

Bad little kids
Go soft.

Like the caterpillar
Plucked off the leaf
By the farmer.
I don’t give a shit about astrology,
But I do like symbolism.

I am a Cancer,
Represented by the crab.

Crabs are fierce.
We’ve got these switchblade pinchers
And these  motorcycle jacket shells.

Real bad boys.

And we’re crafty too--
Coming at you sideways.

The problem is
We’re soft in the middle.

And our tootsie-roll center
Is just three licks away.
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