Blog Archives - Bulls Bard--The Verses

Game 74

3/30/2016

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.

Game 73

3/29/2016

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.

Game 72

3/27/2016

CHI 89 ORL 111

Five police officers

Lined up to my left
Down the dim and flickering
Motel hallway,

Ready to kick in the door
If you didn’t open it.

So you did.

Here I am,
You said.

Pale and grey and naked and thin,
You looked like you’d been kidnapped
Or captured--

And I guess you had been.

Walking through the door,
I felt

Goodbye

Lurking in some dark corner--

Hiding under the piles of trash
Or buried by overflowing ash.

Goodbye.

You put on some underpants
And you told me your stories:

Your grandfather.
The witches.
The metamorphosis.
(goodbye)
How me and Dave are involved.
(goodbye)
The whole fucking
Mythology.

And I listened
(goodbye)
While you told me that
I too
Would go through this
When I was your age,

And you told me
How powerful
(goodbye)
You would soon be.

And as you spoke
(goodbye)
Some strange chasm opened up between us

And you got farther and farther away
(goodbye)
Until I could only see
By squinting, and

Goodbye

Was all I could hear.

Game 71

3/25/2016

CHI 94 NYK 106
Three Strange But True Stories About Basketball

1.

-Man, I’d rather go to a
Baseball game or a
Soccer game any day.

-Not me.
I love basketball.

-Oh--I do too.
It’s just…

There’s just something
About basketball

That makes people
Think they’re
Thugs.

-The kids,
You mean?

-Well yeah,
The kids--

But the parents
Or whoever they are
Too.

The whole crowd.

Like this:

My first year here,
The day before Thanksgiving,
I was working the game.

And some parent
Or whatever
Is arguing a call
And it gets heated.

So I have to throw him out,
But he refuses to leave.

And I try to stay calm:

Look Sir,
It’s district policy
When anybody approaches a ref--

Blah blah blah.

Next thing I know
He’s got his fist balled up
And he’s in my face

-Damn.

-And all I can think is:
This guy is going to ruin
Thanksgiving.

-Weird.

-I know.
But it’s the only thing in my head.
Over and over

And I’m like,
Fuck that.

And so I’m getting ready
To fight--

And I swear to god
I was about to
Kick this guy’s ass.

-(blink blink)

-But guys like him
Only really come
To basketball games.

2.

A visiting professor from the university--
A black man--
Speaking to the football team.

Explaining that pro sports
Is the only real option
For black males.

And that basketball is racist
Because it makes white people
Feel inferior.

3.

I have a friend
Who is not a sports guy.

He could care less, really.

But he follows the Bulls
Through my poetry.

It’s like
How I know
All about politics.

Not because I care,
But because you do.

Game 70

3/24/2016

CHI 107 NYK 115

I remember a story
About Karl Malone--

One of the greatest players
Of all time

Who never won a title
While Michael won six.

Greg Ostertag,
Who played with him,
Said in an interview:

If I worked as hard as Karl does,
I’d be the best center in the NBA.

It was meant
As a compliment.

Obviously.

But that’s
Not
How it was taken.

Malone slammed him into a locker.

Are you telling me
You could be working harder?!

Then do it!

Words are nice
But action is nicer.

5 Haiku

RIP Phife Dawg.
You would have loved tonight’s game.
New York like the Knicks.

Do I give my all
Every second of the game?
I fear that I don’t.

Can’t go hard sometimes.
Or even most of the time.
Got to be always.

Forty-eight minutes
Not forty-five. Six. Seven.
Forty fucking eight.

It’s hard to find gems
In this murky sea of shit.
But I keep looking.

Game 69

3/22/2016

CHI 109 SAC 102

Within a minute
Of television calling the election
For Obama,

My mother had me
On the phone.

This is the first time
In my whole life
That I’ve been proud
To be an American.

My wife (not yet my wife)
Hopped on the El
And went to Grant Park--

To the victory party.

Damn--
I wish I was there.
I bet that was some party.

I was working
In an empty restaurant
In Texas--

Everyone of us
Drunk.
Hopeful.

As though
This
Was the first step
In fixing
Everything.

And maybe it would have been.

But at the end of the day
This is a player’s league.

And some teams,
Despite their talent,
Are just uncoachable.

Game 68

3/20/2016

CHI 92 UTA 85

This poem is dedicated to Taj Gibson
On behalf of the entire Chicago Bulls organization.
Grind on.

I hear that women
Who are unable to have children
Often feel like
Less than women.

As though there exists
One fundamental purpose.

One thing
Connecting her to her sisters--

A birthright
Snatched and vanished.

I cannot begin to understand
How this must feel.

But,

When I see a man with no legs
Begging for change
From my car window,

I become acutely aware
Of my ability to work.

And in these moments

I am my most masculine
And patriotic.

3 Haikus

A poem about
Taj is a poem about
American grind.

Once upon a time,
Men built cities out of steel.
Men like you and me.

I see Taj Gibson
In the guts of the Hancock--
Forging Chicago.

Game 67

3/18/2016

CHI 118 BRK 102

Bojan Bogdanovic
Doesn’t look like a basketball player--
Except that’s exactly what he is.

So that’s exactly
What he looks like.

My very first
Halloween on Sixth Street.

People
Like lava--
Slow and
Thick and bright.

Flowing opposite.

South Side eastbound
North side west.

Separated by police
On horseback
And candy corn walls.

I moved with the current.

But ahead--
Carving through the throngs
Like a semi truck
On the wrong side of the road--
Five gigantic black guys.

Still a couple blocks off,
I could feel
I was in their trajectory.

And as much as I hate to admit it,
I was scared.

Hopefully of their size.

I’d guess the smallest
Was six foot five
Two-hundred and fifty pounds.

And the biggest--
The one leading the pack
Right through everyone
And right toward me--
Was damn near seven feet
And could have weighed anything.

It was clear a collision was coming.

Looking back
These guys must have been
UT’s defensive line or something.

But I was new to Austin--
From Chicago.

And I’ve been in
More than one fight
Over bumping into someone
While walking down the street,

So I was pretty sure
I was gonna get killed.

I tried to force my way over--
To avoid the impact--
But it was useless.

I braced myself
And tried to look hard.

Here is exactly what happened next:

The guy in front--
The really really big one--
Grabbed me by the shoulders
And lifted me off the ground
Like I was a child.

I was a two-hundred pound man.

Then he turned around
And carried me past his crew
And set me safely down.

He could been carrying a bag of groceries
For the effort it took.

I’m sorry
Little Brother.
He said with a smile.

And he turned and walked away.

And somehow
That giant stranger
Taught me something.

Something fundamental

Like shadows
Are just shadows.

Or that cars
Backfiring
Sometimes sound like
Gunshots.

Game 66

3/17/2016

CHI 96 WAS 117

#1

In the ninety-five ninety-six season
I only missed ten
Regular season
Bulls games--

All loses--

Forever affirming
My faith.

But that doesn’t mean
I don’t have my doubts--

My tests and trials along the way.

It only means
I believe in something--

And that belief
Helps me through
Times like this.

#2

I find myself hurrying through these poems lately.

Wanting the magic done.

Past.
Perfect.

The flower shop
Instead of the garden.

The airplane
Instead of the convertible.

The trophy
Instead of the game.

But
Buried treasure
Is found by
Searching.

Digging and digging
Through the dirt and clay and sand

Until finally
The shovel hits something.

Game 65

3/15/2016

CHI 109 TOR 107

Roman
Shakes his head,
Looking down.

The kids around him laugh.

He turns to me:

Man, Mr. M--
In the playoff game last night--
I got dunked on.

The room erupts.

Roman blushes.
But he also knows I’ve got his back.

And that I get it.

You know who doesn’t get dunked on? I say--

People who don’t defend.

You know who doesn’t get dunked on?
People sitting on the bench.
Or in their rooms.

Or wherever.

The other kids
Stop laughing

And Roman cracks a smile.

Man,
Being dunked on
Is how you know you’re in the game.

Haiku

You may look better
Sitting on the bench, but you
Will not get better. *

*Except for when you’re injured