FOUL TROUBLE

by Tammy Smith

Cartoon by Clay Jones

 

I know nothing about the Knicks
other than they’re from New York

and haven’t won a championship
since 1973. I know even less

about the Spurs. Game 3 at the Garden

means more traffic—

something I can’t ignore.
Maybe that’s why I’m paying
extra attention to the hype, the energy
around the rim so electrifying

I decide to watch, for the first time—
the whole game from my living room

wearing fuzzy bunny slippers 

with soft pink pajamas. 

There’s no point pretending

I understand the game

or its rules—

but I know players
who commit fouls get punished
with free throws. 

A flagrant foul sounds poetic,

as satisfying as the swish

of a slam-dunk—but the notion

of excessive contact
as a boundary violation 

makes me want to learn more

about why David Hollander thinks

basketball can save the world. The court, 

layups, turnovers, every rebound--

offense and defense, skill and hustle

underscores that legendary mantra:

you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take,

which has everything and nothing

to do with deciding who gets benched,

or booing Trump.

 

Tammy Smith is a poet and licensed clinical social worker from New Jersey. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in The New Verse News, Paterson Literary Review, ONE ART: a journal of poetry, Thimble Literary Magazine, LIPS, Autumn Sky Poetry Daily, and elsewhere. She received honorable mentions in the Journal of New Jersey Poets 2026 Poets Prize and the 2026 Allen Ginsberg Poetry Awards.

WHITE TURNS TO BLACK

by Mary Clurman

i.

don’t know Black

don’t think Black

don’t speak Black

but like to listen

hear the sharp breaks

twists and turns

White is privilege.

In COVID

we garden

        cook

 think bitter thoughts

await a different regime.

ii.

Hasn’t changed yet!

Not for better:

Made the ballot secret 

  Blacks can’t vote if they can’t read—

can’t win anyway—

  Don’t even try!

  Only eggheads need good schools

   and what do eggheads know?

 Bus ‘em!
     so what,

      got no brains to think with anyway.

Then came jazz.

Music changed.

Boys of Summer

black, winning

Shut the doors!

  Keep ‘em out!

basketball 

Blues 

Hip-Hop

Thurgood Marshall Martin King Anita Hill

strong black middle class

iii.

Who was it

Packed the court,

just stacked ‘em in!

forgetting

           They still get to serve us coffee

coughing 

while our white blood flows as red as it can get. 

It’s time Whites learn from Black.

Mary Clurman, Princeton, NJ, retired Montessori teacher, struggling with the virus news and changing what I can.

WHITEWASHED

by Betsy Mars

Ahmaud Arbery falls to the ground after being shot.

When you want a commodity, a spokesman,
team spirit, sales soaring, think fast,
think brawn, think black.

Think pounding pavement. Think
of those hard-earned calves jumping
on command. Think of a casket.

I mean a basket. A hoop, rope
hanging from its neck.
Think of a shot, circling the rim,

going down as the buzzard, I mean
buzzer, ends the game. If you train off-court
or just enjoy a runner's high, I'm sorry.

Be prepared to run, to shoulder the blame—
a steal from behind—as your muscles
strain, push off on defense. Find the hole,

cut inside. Man-to-man or zone, you don't
stand a chance. They've got the big guns,
the refs in their pocket.

Betsy Mars is a prize-winning poet, educator, photographer, and recent publisher whose first release, Unsheathed: 24 Contemporary Poets Take Up the Knife, came out in October 2019. Her work has appeared in Kissing Dynamite, The Blue Nib, Poetry Super Highway, and Rattle (photography), to name a few, as well as in a number of anthologies. Her first chapbook Alinea (Picture Show Press), came out in January 2019. Her father was a professor and her mother was a social worker, and their progressive beliefs as well as her childhood years in Brazil deeply influenced her values. Her passions are language, travel, and animals; the latter two often conflict as her pets prefer she stay at home. 

FOR PAT SUMMITT: NEVER FORGOTTEN

by Jill Crainshaw

Pat Summitt, who was at the forefront of a broad ascendance of women’s sports, winning eight national basketball championships at the University of Tennessee and more games than any other Division I college coach, male or female, died on Tuesday. She was 64. Her death was confirmed on the website of the Pat Summitt Foundation. Summitt stepped down after 38 seasons and 1,098 victories at Tennessee in April 2012, at 59, less than a year after she learned she had early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. —The New York Times, June 28, 2016

she sits on the edge of her bed
and laces a pair of red converse
hi-tops the toe edge on the left one
scuffed for greatness she is certain of it
and proud of that work-worn abrasion
but no one else knows or even cares
about her dream or that she spends
two hours after sixth grade math class
every day in the backyard where her
springboard to stardom has been
hanging for the last year since she begged
and begged and her daddy gave in and
nailed it to an aging pine tree
not quite regulation height
above ground now made bald from
thousands of toe dancing dribbles
behind her back between her legs
ball leaping up from red southern clay
to stain her hands forever with a passion
no one else gave a second thought to
for a too-tall scrawny girl with a ponytail
who always sat alone at the very back
of bus 81 she tugs the laces tight
the way she likes them then grabs
her rawlings from the closet and heads
out the door for the old pine stopping
as she does every time she leaves her room
to rub her shooting hand over the lady vols
program she got that one time
her cousin took her to a game and
the coach even signed it for her

Jill Crainshaw is a professor at Wake Forest University School of Divinity. Her poems have appeared in *82 Review and Five Magazine and in an anthology by Wicwas Press. She is also the author of a number of books on worship and theology.

COURTING JUSTICE

by Sister Lou Ella Hickman

Middle school hasn't always been the kindest of places, and when a cheerleader with Down syndrome was bullied from the stands during a boys' basketball game, it seemed to be just another example of kids being cruel — until a few players stepped up to make it stop. It turns out that Desiree Andrews, an eighth grader from Kenosha, Wis., had some friends in her corner. "The kids in the audience were picking on D, so we all stepped forward," said Lincoln Middle School basketball player Chase Vasquez, who told TMJ4 in Milwaukee about the moment a teammate finally left the court to ask for the harassment to stop. NY Daily News, March 12, 2015

the cheering crowds provided anonymity
or so they thought . . .
for who would call them on their words
like a foul or an out of bounds
then came time out
for this time
in a world of monstrous bullies
grown from small ones like these . . .
three boys to men also grown
simply said

                stop

                                the

                                          game

losers, your game is over

                                now


Sister Lou Ella Hickman, I.W.B.S. has been a teacher and a librarian.  Her poems have appeared in America, Commonweal, Sojourners, and First Things among others.  Her first book of poetry entitled she: robed and wordless will be released in the fall of 2015 by Press 53.  She is presently a poet, freelance writer, and a spiritual director.

ICARUS IN INDIANAPOLIS

by Earl J. Wilcox

He flies through the feverish air, effortlessly,

raises muscled arms to stop the three-point shot.

His whole body is fueled by forces favoring

the young—the roaring crowd, fame,

the Final Four, a life-changing game.

Soaring and soaring and soaring, he falls,

then falls again, fast---a leg awkwardly bends,

a broken bone pierces his skin. With him,

the world cries in agony.

Earl J. Wilcox writes about aging, baseball, literary icons, politics, and southern culture. His work appears in more than two dozen journals; he is a regular contributor to TheNew Verse News. More of Earl's poetry appears at his blog, Writing by Earl.