I've got a strange new poem, about the San Francisco Giant's stadium as a metaphor for the psyche, and writing poems, out in the new ICONOCLAST (#115).
Something to Live For
San Francisco Giants Stadium
My Freudian brain is a baseball hawker
selling desire, peanuts and home runs
to drunken crowds in the bleachers of the mind.
Cracker Jacks, whisky, cigars—it’s all good, man,
fluorescent smile selling
this Id and Ego battle
for the Holy Grail
at the bottom of the 9th when the bases are loaded
and you’re down by three and if you could only hit that long ball,
that one long-shot poem,
past the grasping mitt of the Superego
with its belief in limits and the unassailable height
of the middle field wall where this wanna-be Superman
leaps with agile grace, one spiked shoe clawing up the green wood to take back what should be yours…but look!
The scuffed white hardball of your deepest dream just flew
not only over the first wall and that last-gasp mitt,
but over the ample bellied fireman with his bucket of beer
waiting to get his meaty paw on this round icon of perfect desire
—like your therapist, the last stand
between you and the world—
as the home run finally sails past the last banner
and you’ve won, finally,
after all these years.
Only to watch your great achievement fall
into the unconscious bay
where the mind’s little clean-up crew
circles the Freudian waters
outside Giants stadium
in tiny yellow and red kayaks,
gawkers praying for just one grand slam souvenir,
this one,
to fall from the sky,
land in hand just like the pros.
You cradle the poem home,
pop open a beer,
praise the gods.