Does anyone know of any good poems about sports? Any outside of baseball?




"The Club Supporters"
Unknown writer - from newspaper in Murwillumbah, NSW 1968

Now the cricket season's over,
it's goodbye to stumps and bails,
For King Footer is now ruling,
with its cheers and boos and wails;

Our Club is full of action,
as supporters toe the mark,
Every team is playing villains,
every referee's a nark.

Our supporters must be biased,
and be loyal to our side,
For our team just don't make errors,
"It's the thing" to be one-eyed;

When we lose there's always reason,
"We wuz robbed" or had bad luck,
Or the referee was dreaming
when that punch flew in the ruck.

If we win, we won It nobly,
through sheer courage, strength and grit,
If some dope says, "We were lucky,"
half the Club would have a fit;

We don't accept excuses,
from the opposition fans,
We say their team is hopeless,
just a bunch of "also-rans."

We sling off at their coaches,
‘till the temper's really strained,
And tell them that their players
have been badly over-trained;

Oh, boy, we do some stirring,
being loyal is great fun,
(But we lay ourselves wide open,
if the locals should get "done").

So just to prove we're loyal,
we go on with all this rot,
And we'll even say our player's a Gasnier...
when he's not!

But it all adds up to football,
as we barrack in the cold,
One-eyed and deeply biased,
we will never be under-sold.

Les

Landmine Nightmare
© Rosemary Dun - 2000

She had a dream last night
Of bright and sunny childhood
Of running, faster and faster
With hair ribboned behind her,
Feet barely touching
Til she was up, up and flying.

She had a dream last night
And her plastic leg was flesh
As she laughed, kicked tin cans
With her brother,
And her sister,
In the dirt of her village.

She had a dream last night
Dipping into sparkled water
Lifting high to carry homewards
Five mile there,
And five mile back,
Walk along the usual track.

She had a dream last night
The land belongs to no-one
Was what she said,
Not understanding
Their urge to maim
What can't be had.

She had a dream last night
Of playing football
Of dazzling with her foot control,
Of crowds cheering, crowds calling,
As she ran
With the ball
Outwitting tackles,
Til she scored
All sure footed
Hard, she kicked it.
Hard she kicked it home.

She had a dream last night.

Les

You'll find some in The Penguin Cricketer's Companion, ed Alan Ross. Ross himself wrote some good poems about cricket and football.
Gavin Ewart in "A Late Picking" has a long superb poem about cricketers who killed themselves.
John Masefield: Reynard the Fox

Cricket is very popular in Australia - this one's an old bush ballad -



HOW M’DOUGAL TOPPED THE SCORE


A peaceful spot is Piper’s Flat. The folks that live around —
They keep themselves by keeping sheep and turning up the ground;
But the climate is erratic, and the consequences are
The struggle with the elements is everlasting war.
We plough, and sow, and harrow — then sit down and pray for rain;
And then we all get flooded out and have to start again.
But the folk are now rejoicing as they ne’er rejoiced before,
For we’ve played Molongo cricket, and M’Dougal topped the score!

Molongo had a head on it, and challenged us to play
A single-innings match for lunch — the losing team to pay.
We were not great guns at cricket, but we couldn’t well say, “No!”
So we all began to practise, and we let the reaping go.
We scoured the Flat for ten miles round to muster up our men,
But when the list was totalled we could only number ten.
Then up spoke big Tim Brady: he was always slow to speak,
And he said — “What price M’Dougal, who lives down at Cooper’s Creek?”

So we sent for old M’Dougal, and he stated in reply
That he’d never played at cricket, but he’d half a mind to try.
He couldn’t come to practise — he was getting in his hay,
But he guessed he’d show the beggars from Molongo how to play.
Now, M’Dougal was a Scotchman, and a canny one at that,
So he started in to practise with a paling for a bat .
He got Mrs Mac. to bowl him, but she couldn’t run at all,
So he trained his sheep-dog, Pincher, how to scout and fetch the ball.

Now, Pincher was no puppy; he was old, and worn, and grey;
But he understood M’Dougal, and — accustomed to obey —
When M’Dougal cried out “Fetch it!” he would fetch it in a trice,
But, until the word was, “Drop it!” he would grip it like a vice.
And each succeeding night they played until the light grew dim:
Sometimes M’Dougal struck the ball - sometimes the ball struck him!
Each time he struck, the ball would plough a furrow in the ground,
And when he missed the impetus would turn him three times round.

The fatal day at length arrived — the day that was to see
Molongo bite the dust, or Piper’s Flat knocked up a tree!
Molongo’s captain won the toss, and sent his men to bat,
And they gave some leather-hunting to the men of Piper’s Flat.
When the ball sped where M’Dougal stood, firm planted in his track,
He shut his eyes, and turned him round, and stopped it — with his back!
The highest score was twenty-two, the total sixty-six,
When Brady sent a yorker down that scattered Johnson’s sticks.

Then Piper’s Flat went in to bat, for glory and renown,
But, like the grass before the scythe, our wickets tumbled down.
“Nine wickets down for seventeen, with fifty more to win!”
Our captain heaved a heavy sigh, and sent M’Dougal in.
“Ten pounds to one you’ll lose it!” cried a barracker from town;
But M’Dougal said “I’ll tak’ it mon!” and planked the money down.
Then he girded up his moleskins in a self-reliant style,
Threw-off his hat and boots, and faced the bowler with a smile.

He held the bat the wrong side out, and Johnson with a grin
Stepped lightly to the bowling crease, and sent a “wobbler” in;
M’Dougal spooned it softly back, and Johnson waited there,
But M’Dougal, crying “Fetch it!” started running like a hare.
Molongo shouted “Victory! He’s out as sure as eggs,”
When Pincher started through the crowd, and ran through Johnson’s legs.
He seized the ball like lightning; then he ran behind a log,
And M’Dougal kept on running, while Molongo chased the dog!

They chased him up, they chased him down, they chased him round, and then
He darted through a slip-rail as the scorer shouted “Ten!”
M’Dougal puffed; Molongo swore; excitement was intense;
As the scorer marked down twenty, Pincher cleared a barbed-wire fence.
“Let us head him!” shrieked Molongo. “Brain the mongrel with a bat!”
“Run it out! Good old M’Dougal!” yelled the men of Piper’s Flat.
And M’Dougal kept on jogging, and then Pincher doubled back,
And the scorer counted “Forty” as they raced across the track.

M'Dougal's legs were going fast, Molongo’s breath was gone —
But still Molongo chased the dog — M’Dougal struggled on.
When the scorer shouted “Fifty” then they knew the chase would cease;
And M’Dougal gasped out “Drop it!” as he dropped within his crease.
Then Pincher dropped the ball, and as instinctively he knew
Discretion was the wiser plan, he disappeared from view;
And as Molongo’s beaten men exhausted lay around
We raised M’Dougal shoulder high, and bore him from the ground.

We bore him to M’Ginniss’s, where lunch was ready laid,
And filled him up with whisky-punch, for which Molongo paid.
We drank his health in bumpers, and we cheered him three times three,
And when Molongo got its breath, Molongo joined the spree.
And the critics say they never saw a cricket match like that,
When M’Dougal broke the record in the game at Piper’s Flat;
And the folk are jubilating as they never did before;
For we played Molongo cricket — and M’Dougal topped the score!

Thomas Edward Spencer (1845-1911)

Les, do you have any particular sport in mind? Golf? Football? (which kind?) Horse-racing? Polo? Tennis? Deck quoits? There are poems for all of them.

You could fill a book with poems on cricket, but to appreciate them fully you need to understand the game and the jargon. For instance:

THE BALLAD OF A HOMELESS BAT
by John Kendal

The man was going in to bat;
The bowler, flushed with joy,
Stood waiting to complete his hat;
There came a village boy

"Put off your gloves of rubber proof,
Unguard each careful shin.
The curse has fallen on your roof;
Your house has tumbled in."

White as his boots the batsman grew;
He cast his pads away;
His gauntlets to the winds he threw.
The Captain cried, "I say,

Go in, poor homeless one, and bat,
Stem as the nether rock;
E'en though that house of yours be flat,
You'd better have your knock."

"My little home," the batsman wept,
"So trim it was and tight;
I always had it nicely swept;
It had electric light.

And is there left no tiny shred
Of the whole bag of tricks?"
The boy with urchin relish said
Laconically, "Nix."

"Let me go hence; nay, hold me not."
Then loud the Captain cried,
"You, you alone can stay the rot;
Think, batsman, of the side.

Your kindling eye, your stubborn heart
Alone can make things good;
You would not land us in the cart";
The victim said, "I would."

Then spake a man of subtler mould:
"A year ago, no more,
Yon bowler, haughty man and cold,
Had you out leg-before.

Did you not seal a solemn oath
To clump him for that crime
O'er yon tall tree, or tent, or both?
You did. Then now's the time."

Up sprang the batsman with a frown,
And like a man he spoke:
"Let every house come crashing down,
The pub dissolve in smoke;

I will not guard each careful shin;
Give me my bat, no more;
With knuckles bared will I go in
And larn him leg-before."

He seized his trusty bat and went
A broken soul was he,
But he lammed the blighter o'er the tent,
The bounder o'er the tree.


And here's one I found in an English school magazine from the early 1950s:

THE BOWLER
by “Abel” (in The Salopian No. 721)

Stupendous scores he never scored;
A hundred runs he never ran;
But once, in a forgotten game,
He bowled a man.

No doubt a timely stroke of luck
Assisted him to do the trick;
It was of an abysmal length,
But came through quick.

Alas! That game was years ago,
And many cricket seasons past;
He’s bowled with fervour ever since,
But not as fast.

That day has grown in splendour now,
That ball so much applause has earned;
He flighted it with fiendish skill,
And how it turned!

In that momentous game he reached
The peak to which he must aspire.
That was, of all his cricket days,
His finest hour.

Then let us all thank kindly fate
Who, sweetly in his hour of need,
Has planted in his sporting heart
A mustard seed.

Actually young 'Abel' was rather naughty not to disclose that much of this this was plagiarised from a poem called 'The Catch' by Alfred Cochrane (1865-1948), which is in the Ross collection cited by RJ Allen, but as Abel's version is a lot more elegant, he can be forgiven.

Ian



Post Edited (10-26-04 09:53)

A golf paradox
by Norman H Chance - from Chance Hits, 1915

Here's to the goddess, chic and sweet,
Most 'witchingly garbed from head to feet,
Who foozles and fumbles, and really can't play,
Yet whose "form is perfect", the men all say.

Here's one by Robert Browning:

Robert Browning - Boot And Saddle

Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!
Rescue my Castle, before the hot day
Brightens the blue from its silvery grey,

(Chorus) "Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!"

Ride past the suburbs, asleep as you'd say;
Many's the friend there, will listen and pray
"God's luck to gallants that strike up the lay,

(Chorus) "Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!"

Forty miles off, like a roebuck at bay,
Flouts Castle Brancepeth the Roundheads array:
Who laughs, Good fellows ere this, by my fay,

(Chorus) "Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!"

Who? My wife Gertrude; that, honest and gay,
Laughs when you talk of surrendering, "Nay!
I've better counsellors; what counsel they?"

(Chorus) "Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!"

Les

More cricket

BRAHMA
after Emerson

If the wild bowler thinks he bowls
Or the wild batsman thinks he's bowled,
They know not, poor misguided souls,
They too shall perish unconsoled.
I am the batsman and the bat.
I am the bowler and the ball.
The umpire, the pavilion cat,
The roller, pitch and stumps and all.

-Andrew Lang

Here's one that covers deck quoits - just:

The Complete Sailor
By Reginald Arkell

I don’t know who the Purser pays;
I don’t know what the Anchor weighs;

I don’t know where the Hornpipe’s kept,
Or when they have the Funnel swept.

I don’t know when they burn the Log,
Or if the smoke brings on the fog.

I don’t know why the Sheets are wet;
But I’m prepared to take a bet

That none who sails upon the sea
Can throw a prettier quoit than me.

I bought a set of brand new clubs,
and hurried out to the tee.
The new clubs are simply great,
but alas, I'm the same old me

Dorothy Parker - Chant for Dark Hours

Some men, some men
Cannot pass a
Book shop.
(Lady, make your mind up, and wait your life away.)


Some men, some men
Cannot pass a
Crap game.
(He said he'd come at moonrise, and here's another day!)


Some men, some men
Cannot pass a
Bar-room.
(Wait about, and hang about, and that's the way it goes.)


Some men, some men
Cannot pass a
Woman.
(Heaven never send me another one of those!)


Some men, some men
Cannot pass a
Golf course.
(Read a book, and sew a seam, and slumber if you can.)


Some men, some men
Cannot pass a
Haberdasher's.
(All your life you wait around for some damn man!)


Les



Post Edited (10-27-04 23:38)

The Golfing Phenomenon

I shot sixty six today.
Everything seemed to click.
The drives were long, the putts true.
My swing was unerring and slick.

I may enter a tournament soon.
The pros will feel the pressure.
Opponents will sing a woeful tune
While I grin like a Cheshire.

If I can maintain this torrid pace
Fame will surely be mine.
I may even shoot for the full eighteen
What I shot today for nine.

Copyright; Jay

Duddunt scan, Jay.

Another one from Reginald Arkell:

Playing the Games

A father was passing a Public School
With an anxious and troubled heart,
For there, in the playground, he saw his son
Sitting aloof––apart.
Others were playing their simple games,
Laughing in childish joy;
So the father climbed o’er the school-yard fence
And said to his darling boy:

Why don’t you play with the other boys
When they want to play with you?
Why don’t you whistle and make a noise
As your father was proud to do?
Football and cricket are splendid games,
And fives is a nice game too.
Why don’t you play with the other boys?
They are waiting to play with you.

The father climbed over the school-yard fence
And stood by his only son.
He wanted to see him Playing the Game,
Just as he, too, had done.
But Cecil replied, with an angry pout:
“These games are a beastly bore.
Take me away from these dreadful boys,
To play with the girl next door.”

THIS SUCKS S*** i hate this fu**ing site....get a life

Basil Bunting said it better, Tavis.

WHAT THE CHAIRMAN TOLD TOM by Basil Bunting

Poetry? It’s a hobby.
I run model trains.
Mr Shaw breeds pigeons.

It’s not work.
You don’t sweat.
Nobody pays for it.
You could advertise soap.

Art, that’s opera; or repertory –
The Desert Song.
Nancy was in the chorus.

But to ask for twelve pounds a week –
married aren’t you? –
you’ve got a nerve.

How could I look the bus conductor
in the face
if I paid you twelve pounds?

Who says it’s poetry anyhow?
My ten year old
can do it and rhyme.

I get three thousand and expenses,
a car, vouchers,
but I’m an accountant.

They do what I tell them,
my company.
What do you do?

Nasty little words, nasty long words,
it’s unhealthy.
I want to wash when I meet a poet.

They’re Reds, addicts, all delinquents.
What you write is rot.

Mr Hines says so, and he’s a schoolteacher,
he ought to know.
Go and find work.

In the same vein, Marian, Arthur might be another Tavis, who knows?

Job Skills

Arthur studied night and day,
For every course he could.
His hands they worked with brass and clay
With bricks and glass and wood

He wielded saws and flourished trowels
Made mortice joints and soldered.
He welded steel, and glued up dowels
In every field he soldiered

For five long years he honed his skills
Not for him a failure.
It's easy when you have the will
To be a doc. or tailor

And then one day there came his chance
A job had comes his way
They'd see his value at a glance
He'd easily earn their pay.

Jaw bent firm, and with steely eye
He was the best, and knew it
But when he came to have a go
He couldn't bloody do it

Copyright; Keith Allibone

Brava!

Check out lostpoetryofgolf.com for a lead to some great new poems about golf. Like, here's an e.e. cummings parody:

in Finally-
spring when the fairways are mud-
mucky the cute
little drinkgirl

beckons lars and me

and me-and-lars come
trotting from chip shots and
putts and it's
spring

when the greens are winter-kill weird

the luscious
young drinkgirl whistles
at lars and me
and jim-and-his-buddies come panting

from tee boxes or bunkers to see

it's
spring
and
the

lusty-eyed

drinkWoman winks goodbye
to lars
and
me

'Go and play in the middle' by John Hegley deserves a place in this thread:

[www.cs.rice.edu]

What about Jim Daniels' poem, "Between Periods"---
a sports poem about pain and cancer.

Lisa

The Golf Links

Sarah N. Cleghorn

The golf links lie so near the mill
That almost every day
The laboring children can look out
And see the men at play.

john

Invention
--Billy Collins

Tonight the moon is a cracker,
with a bite out of it
floating in the night,

and in a week or so
according to the calendar
it will probably look

like a silver football,
and nine, maybe ten days ago
it reminded me of a thin bright claw.

But eventually --
by the end of the month,
I reckon --

it will waste away
to nothing,
nothing but stars in the sky,

and I will have a few nights
to myself,
a little time to rest my jittery pen.


Les

The Geebung Polo Club.
--A.B. ("Banjo") Paterson


It was somewhere up the country, in a land of rock and scrub,
That they formed an institution called the Geebung Polo Club.
They were long and wiry natives from the rugged mountain side,
And the horse was never saddled that the Geebungs couldn't ride;
But their style of playing polo was irregular and rash -
They had mighty little science, but a mighty lot of dash:
And they played on mountain ponies that were muscular and strong,
Though their coats were quite unpolished, and their manes and tails were long,
And they used to train those ponies wheeling cattle in the scrub;
They were demons, were the members of the Geebung Polo Club.



It was somewhere down the country, in the city's smoke and steam,
That a polo club existed, called "The Cuff and Collar Team".
As a social institution 'twas a marvellous success,
For the members were distinguished by exclusiveness and dress.
They had natty little ponies that were nice, and smooth and sleek,
For their cultivated owners only rode 'em once a week.
So they started up the country in pursuit of sport and fame.
For they meant to show the Geebungs how they ought to play the game;
And they took their valets with them - just to give their boots a rub
Ere they started operations on the Geebung Polo Club.



Now my readers can imagine how the contest ebbed and flowed,
When the Geebung boys going it was time to clear the road;
And the game was so terrific that ere half the time was gone
A spectator's leg was broken - just from merely looking on.
For they waddied one another till the plain was strewn with dead.
While the score was kept so even that they neither got ahead.
And the Cuff and Collar Captain, when he tumbled off to die
Was the last surviving player - so the game was called a tie.
Then the Captain of the Geebungs raised him slowly from the ground,
Though his wounds were mostly mortal, yet he fiercely gazed around;
There was no one to oppose him - all the rest were in a trance.
So he scrambled on his pony for his last expiring chance.
For he meant to make an effort to get victory to his side;
So he struck at goal - and missed it - then he tumbled off and died



By the old Campaspe River, where the breezes shake the grass,
There's a row of little gravestones that the stockmen never pass,
For they bear a crude inscription saying, "Stranger, drop a tear,
For the Cuff and Collar players and the Geebung boys lie here."
And on misty moonlit evenings, while the dingoes howl around,
You can see their shadows flitting down that phantom polo ground;
You can hear the loud collisions as the flying players meet,
And the rattle of the mallets, and the rush of ponies' feet,
Till the terrified spectator rides like blazes to the pub -
He's been haunted by the spectres of the Geebung Polo Club.

Les



Post Edited (01-05-05 22:06)

Thanks, Les. One of Banjo's classics. A fun one to recite.

Out of respect for him, and for accuracy, two little errors need correcting. In the penultimate line of the penultimate stanza, he wrote 'get victory', not 'get the victory'; and in the third line of the last stanza he wrote 'crude', not 'rude'.

Thanks, Ian, those corrections have been made.


Les

Do They Know?
A.B. (Banjo) Paterson

Do they know? At the turn to the straight
Where the favourites fail,
And every last atom of weight
Is telling its tale;
As some grim old stayer hard-pressed
Runs true to his breed,
And with head in front of the rest
Fights on in the lead;
When the jockeys are out with the whips,
With a furlong to go,
And the backers grow white in the lips --
Do you think they don't know?
Do they know? As they come back to weigh
In a whirlwind of cheers,
Though the spurs have left marks of the fray,
Though the sweat on the ears
Gathers cold, and they sob with distress
As they roll up the track,
They know just as well their success
As the man on their back.
As they walk through a dense human lane
That sways to and fro,
And cheers them again and again,
Do you think they don't know?

Les

My experience with show dogs is that they do know- whether it's learning that the judge pointing at them means good things or if they're reacting to our reactions is something I don't know.

pam

The Wreck of the Golfer
--A.B. (Banjo) Paterson

It was the Bondi golfing man
Drove off from the golf house tee,
And he had taken his little daughter
To bear him company.

"Oh, Father, why do you swing the club
And flourish it such a lot?"
"You watch it fly o'er the fences high!"
And he tried with a brassey shot.

"Oh, Father, why did you hit the fence
Just there where the brambles twine?"
And the father he answered never a word,
But he got on the green in nine.

"Oh, Father, hark from behind those trees,
What dismal yells arrive!"
"'Tis a man I ween on the second green,
And I've landed him with my drive."

"Oh, Father, why does the poor Chinee
Fall down on his knees and cry?"
"He taketh me for his Excellency,
And he thinks once hit twice shy."

So on they fared to the waterhole,
And he drove with a lot of dash,
But his balls full soon in the dread lagoon
Fell down with a woeful splash.

"Oh, Father, why do you beat the sand
Till it flies like the carded wool?"
And the father he answered never a word,
For his heart was much too full.

"Oh, Father, why are they shouting 'fore'
And screaming so lustily?"
But the father he answered never a word,
A pallid corpse was he.

For a well-swung drive on the back of his head
Had landed and laid him low.
Lord save us all from a fate like this
When next to the links we go.

Les



Post Edited (01-13-05 01:25)

Golly, Les, where did you find that? It's not one of Banjo's well known ones, and I'd bet most of his fans have never seen it; but sure enough, it's there in his complete works (the two volume 'Song of the Bush' and 'Song of the Pen'). Written early in his poetic career.

I suggest you edit to remove the duplication, and separate the first two four-line stanzas which have been incorrectly run together.

Ian

Hi! I am desperately searching for a poem about people yelling at a child at a sporting event. I read one somewhere and was wondering if you could help. It stated something along the lines of....so when you yell remember it is someones son,,,,if you could help it would be greatly appreciated, I have someone that REALLY needs to read it. Thanks!