TO BE IN LOVE WITH BASEBALL

When you first discover baseball,

When you’re given your first glove,

You find out at a tender age

What it’s like to fall in love.

You learn to play; you learn the rules;

What the game’s about.

There are three outs in each inning;

It’s three strikes and you’re out.

When first you see a big league park,

Those stands, that field of green,

You know as long as you shall live

You won’t forget that scene.

So you root for the old home team,

A favorite player choose,

And you learn life’s hardest lesson;

There are lots of times you lose.

Then you realize your parents

And your grandfather, too,

All have this in common,

They love it just like you.

And seven decades down the road

That love is still the same.

For all the memories you have

What counts is the next game.

For your whole life it’s part of you.

Its praises must be sung.

For to be in love with baseball

Is to be forever young.

BIG PAPI’S BOMBS

Start carving the statue; get the site ready

Right on the sidewalk between Yaz and Teddy.

He’s King of Clutch Hitters; fit him for the crown.

Get driving instructions to old Cooperstown.

He’s our Hall of Famer: he’ll get there with ease.

The Pope will proclaim him Saint David Ortiz.

To us he’s Big Papi; we love it that way.

The big pop’s in his bat when he saves the day.

All other teams fear him, from east to west coast.

He launches those big bombs when it matters most.

On the day that he is installed in the Hall

Sox Nation will be there; his fans, one and all.

And when the Hall plaque is put into his reach

We’ll pray that he won’t launch F-bombs in his speech.

THE BEARDS OF SUMMER

In oh twelve the Red Sox wound up in last place.

They stunk, but they got themselves back in the race.

In thirteen they hit and they threw and they slid.

They won the World Series, that’s what those guys did.

They hustled, they bustled, they played hard, they gave.

In fact they did everything except shave.

In springtime, whenever someone hit a double,

You’d notice that on his face was some stubble.

When spring turned to summer there started a buzz.

The more times they won the more fuzz there was.

The season wore on and the pace became brisker;

They kept winning games, sometimes by a whisker.

By the time it was over, this sounds kind of weird,

Just about every guy had a beard.

So now we can say how they got all those wins.

They won by the hair on their chinny-chin-chins.

Dick Flavin