Darn you, Kat, if I stay with your prompts long enough I just may work through all of my childhood issues. Like softball. Brought on by this week’s prompt number 3, “assigned” me by www.random.org: Incorporate the following line into a poem of your own: catching air with my fingers (inspired by Buttered Toast Rocks).
PE
Every day
Softball is PE and PE is Softball where I grew up
Get sent to right field
Pray ball goes to left field
Pray all pop flies go elsewhere
Anywhere but here
Stand in a “ready” position
Pray for once to be the “athletic” one instead of the “smart” one
Act enthusiastic on the outside
Cower on the inside
Until that fluke of a day
When it all suddenly makes sense
Something changes
I watch the ball from the moment of impact with the bat
right into my glove!
It seems so simple, so elegant, so satisfying
It really is all about “keeping your eye on the ball”
Until the next day when the magic ends
The courage evaporates
Every other pop fly in the years and decades to come
Leaves me catching air with my fingers
Wife of one, Mom of two, Friend of many. My pronouns are she/her/hers.
Boy that brought back a lot of memories of softball!
Stopping by from Mama Kat's
That could have been a scene from my childhood. Except, I didn't catch the ball completely and it bounced out of my mitt, and smashed into my nose. One bloody nose and two black eyes later, I was very hesitant to try catch a ball again!
Yep I used to play softball!
Thank goodnes we never had to do this for PE. I would have definitely bombed. Great poem.