Wayne Zade

Wayne Zade teaches in the English Department at Westminster College in Fulton, MO. Recent poems have appeared in SPORT LITERATE and THECORTLAND REVIEW, and he has reviewed jazz recordings for the online magazine ALL ABOUT JAZZ. His first book of poetry, AMERICA'S CLASSICAL MUSIC, is in search of a publisher. He can be reached at zadew@JAYNET.WCMO.EDU.

NOT AN OLYMPIC SPORT

Like two kids playing catch,

I go back and forth with myself

about whether sports change over time.

There's my father playing football

with a cap stuffed with newspaper for a helmet.

It's about 1928, and these guys love the game.

Later, he graduated to leather, like the cowboys.

Pictures of football players in the '30s nad '40s

show the faces of young men looking grim, determined,

and padded, prepared for the worst. which came.

Many did not come back alive.

Then it wasn't football or fun.

The first plastic helmets of the '50s broke easily too,

but if you used your head you could look out

over one facebar or two and still see a linebacker

before he speared you for the sack.

Then in the interest of more safety we wore the "birdcage,"

our eyes like lost starlings, or POW's, or MIA's.

In New Orleans or Minneapolis,

it could be hotter or colder than hell.

In a dome stadium, any seat is a good one.

"FATS" DOMINO

I don't know how long it'd been since I thought of "Blueberry Hill"

by "Fats" Domino, or heard it on the car radio, driving nowhere

important but wanting something on besides the background music

we all live with but seldom acknowledge, too busy trying to talk or

listen

every day of our lives to the people more or less close to us.

I never even liked "Blueberry Hill," or "Fats" Domino, who must have

some other name, such as Richard or Clarence or Eugene. I don't know

if Domino is really his last name, either; probably not.

and I have to wonder, as I would about those millions of people with

nicknames,

when "Fats" became "Fats," and how he felt about that.

He might have been hurt by that name and sung and played better

because he was hurt and knew one day he would never be Johnny Mathis.

Onstage, he might have forgotten he was heavy or that some people find

fat

unattractive or cause for alarm or that everybody in the Domino family

was heavy but could laugh and have a good time anyway.

We don't think about "Fats" Domino having a family or friends,

but he must try to talk or listen to somebody more or less close to him.

Like Wallace Stevens, he was rnever really out there on a hill in

Tennessee

by himself. Who knows all the lyrics to "Blueberry Hill"?

Who cares. Walking with you, I found my thrill.

FAILURE

The bad test grade, not going steady anymore, not knowing

that kids say "going out" now and not "going steady,"

not checking the pressure in your tires at least once a year

and ending up with a flat on the interstate at night,

not watering your plants and watching them wilt,

missing trash day, tossing your pop cans and not recycling,

not paying the bills on time, not leaving the charge cards home,

talking when you should be listening,

listening but not hearing,

relationships, the relationship, The Relationship,

not helping with the dishes, not helping with the laundry,

not grieving, not forgiving but leaving,

loving someone else who loves someone else,

forgetting a birthday, not calling or taking a message,

not taking precautions, not remembering names,

lying, crying, not taking the blame.

Wayne Zade