Todd Matson


Whalers Field

The neighborhood
gang found a field with
weeds taller than the tallest kid,
and they saw there a diamond in the
rough, claimed it as their own, ‘cause finders
keepers, and they mowed the field flat, cleaned up
trash, sticks, rocks, filled in crevices, ditches and pot holes,
fashioned a diamond, landscaped a pitcher’s mound, built a backstop
and bleachers, marked off a homerun fence, named it Whalers Field in honor
of all the baseballs to be whaled out of the park, and the gang played ball,
whaling homeruns and grand slams, stealing bases around the diamond,
stealing hearts around the neighborhood, playing double-headers,
going into extra innings, until the bulldozers came to steal
Whalers Field.  The gang watched bulldozers destroy
the pitcher’s mound, bury the diamond, plough
up the infield, turn the outfield into mounds
of dirt, because someone in a hard hat
saw residential housing there.

That is when
the umpire shouted
one last call: “Play ball!”
And the gang played all day
and late into the night, going into
many extra innings, whaling
dirt clods at bulldozers
and hard hats, until
the game was
rained out.

Todd Matson is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist. His poetry has been published in The Journal of Pastoral Care and Counseling and Soul-Lit: A Journal of Spiritual Poetry. He has also written lyrics for songs recorded by a number of contemporary Christian music artists, including The Gaither Vocal Band.

 
 

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