Tuesday with TAB

These three poems, written by The Amazing Bob in 1988, totally explain/illustrate why I was madly in love with him – still am. OK, they show some of why. His ineffable, glorious spirit, his sharp, dry, peasant-by-way-of-Harvard wit, his beauty (outside and in) and molto generous soul – all this, THIS is why he was the sun to my Venus of Willendorf.

Saturday Morning Baseball

We create baseball each Saturday morning
at Cleveland Circle where we gather
'round the diamond to hold
uglier realities at bat's length,
to suspend Time for a few innings
of innocent play,
with wood bats and well worn gloves
and balls mottled with
the tan of infield dirt,
stained green with outfield grass,
yellowed with use like old linoleum.

At game's end we beat the bush
for newer baseballs fouled and left
by players with a informs and umpires.
We play by the rules but the only
two rules are: Nobody gets hurt,
Everybody has fun.
So we play in the sun
On humid 100º days.
We play in the rain
and through the slush.

Here in New England the season begins
when we first find a large, plowed
parking lot and continues until
just before Christmas, when
for a half dozen Saturdays
we return to our parents
and lovers, to the world of schedules
and shopping and televised events.

In the off season,
we age.
8/88

Spit

I like to spit on Rolls Royces
It really makes me feel good
Just to stroll by, let a gob fly
Then watch its splat on the hood.

I saw a Jag on the corner
The driver looked so aloof
As I walked past, I hawked one fast
And sent it dead onto the roof.

They like to park in the crosswalk
As if us peasants are trash
I stop where I am and work up a clam
And laugh as I let it splash.
12/88

Passion

I like our slow and easy,
Our food, music or a movie
The way we talk casually
Browse catalogs leisurely
The way in a quiet room
You seduce my soul
Before our bodies ever touch
You're there in the clutch
As clothes and inhibitions
Fall like silk and candy wrappers
Revealing the soft sweetness of you
Melting, sticky, tasty
But never too hasty
As I move to meet your erotic assertions
I like our call-and-response
Of nibbles, kisses, caresses
Amid discarded dresses
And my sigh that confesses
My desire — our exertions
Prolonged, mutual, divine
I must admit you thrill me
(Though soon my back will kill me)

11/88