COUNTRY SONG FOR MY BASEBALL TEAM

by Earl J. Wilcox

Photo by Jeff Curry/USA Today via Sports Illustrated.

I know I can divorce you,

being unfaithful and untrue.

 

This late June—barely real 

summer yet—you tease me

with a rare afternoon win,

heat up the Division for a day

or so, cause me to sweat &

and swear I will never leave you.

Lately, tho, you break my heart.

I feel deceived when you bring up

players from the farm team, send

down better hitters you’ve been

flirting with. Last week, I

almost went to seek a lawyer

 

when you simply rolled over

for a bush-league, slutty team.

What happened to our spring trainin’

plans, hopes, and dreams, that you’d be

 

faithful this season, give me your

best, not waste scarce money on

 

players like that stud from out west--

You know the one I mean—look what

 

it got us. Hank Williams was right

about cheatin’ hearts, they do tell

 

on you, make us feel so lonesome

we could die. I’m getting’ in my truck,

 

pick up some brewskis no matter what

some say, there’s a lot of crying in baseball.

 

Growing up country in the American South, Earl Wilcox thrives on Cardinals baseball, Dolly Parton, Willie Nelson, and some Elvis.

BOOMER'S LAMENT ON THE 55TH ANNIVERSARY OF JFK'S ASSASSINATION

by George Salamon
November 22, 2018

"Did a president of the United States, while in command of total nuclear war, detach himself enough from its power to give his life for peace?" — James W. Douglass,  JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters.

We imagined everything differently
Before our generation's leader was killed.

We read Albert Camus, our bible,
And vowed to be neither executioner nor victim.

We wanted to be rebels, in our fashion,
But ended up consumers in their niches.

We witnessed the Empire's revenge
When bullets took down our peers at Kent State.

We stumbled into our adult lives in the Seventies
While the spirit of Nixon settled over America.

We protested when his agents devastated Vietnam,
Now we howl as Agent Orange deconstructs the presidency.

We tried to make a difference
As the Armies of the Night

We buried our hopes with our heroes
As the colors faded after 1968.

Editor's note: Although he did not film the home movie streaming above, the 13-year-old who now edits this journal will never forget being in the crowd at that place on that day to cheer the future President.

George Salamon has the opposite view of the 1960s from those expressed by the Wall Street Journal's editorial writers.  He lives and writes in St. Louis, MO.