Game Ball

It’s out there now   groggy on the soggy, sprinkler-soaked lawn
A once nearly-bursting bladder - nearly totally now - deflated
Shimmer-red octagonal panels, scratched and color- faded

One last Friday's frantic semi-professional fixture - Wilson official game ball
Rebounds now the final and futile countdown scrambles, the clock almost expired
Another anti-climax of a yet another loosing season, and two dozen dreams retired

Kept guarded then as momento, for a decade, on a crowded closet shelf
Packed away - mostly out of sight and out of mind -  a token cherished memory
Passed on in appreciation it was,  to a young part time soccer referee

Then with passing permitted through neglecting of vigilance and vision
To become a kick around back yard practice ball for twelve year-old boys
Wallows now in its puddle of inertia   No more thunks that  thunking voice

Too ugly even anymore, insists my wife, to bring that damned ball inside
But I can’t point fingers at the boys outside, oblivious as they were, to the claim
That such a spherical symbol of a time and place when everyone knew my name

No  it wasn't autographed by the team -  I've sort of thing about things like that
But it was coaxed across some magic carpets by  enfamous Stan the Pizza Man
and 'twas banana-bent corner kicked by long-haired and handsom Yilmaz Orhan

mea culpa, mea culpa I admit near totally   in retrospect at fault
That such keepsake should be squandered, one I’d hoped to keep nursing along
So every now and then my nostalgia simmers into the rhythm of a Memphis song

The later in the game it's gotten  -  the more I  think   about those Friday nights
when I was one of those men in the middle - the whistle fixed in my firm fingers
The scoreboard clock - even then still  tic tic ticking, because it for no man lingers