Hippie Squared: Before the Jump

So with a blog due last night and a basketball game to watch, I thought I’d try a little experiment: write a poem about the game in real time as I watched the game. Didn’t get very far: Elise came home with dinner, we paused the game, fed the dogs and cats, had pina coladas on the patio, came back and watched the rest together. But I got a chunk out of it that I like. And I aim to continue the practice throughout the series, so by the next Hippie Squared I’ll have more. In the meantime, after the jump, a little basketball poem I’m calling “Before the Jump.”

Before the Jump (Lakers-Celtics NBA Finals 2010 Game 2 Impressions)

It starts from before the beginning:
Player introductions.
Laker Center Andrew Bynum bounces out
Shoulder-butts a teammate and spins off him.
Derek Fisher ducks and crab-walks out through standing teammates,
Brushing each hand, then in a ritual series of hand motions
He pats his thighs, cross-brushes his lapels, passes both hands
Across his bald head, pats his lapels.
Kobe strides out, brushing and slapping a gauntlet of teammates hands,
His game-face on: mouth face set, eyes focused straight ahead
And right past the present into the game, unflashy bravado of the champion,
The one who has done it and knows how to do it
How it works and feels in the mind
Where championships are won, how it works and feels in the body,
Where championships are won.
Phil Jackson with his clipboard is inscrutable, unreadable, calmer than anyone.
How many times has he been here before? He’s climbed this Everest
More than most and he’s used to the thin air up here,
He can breathe at this height and in this pressure,
He’s trained his lungs, patient bellows, to a slow and even pace
And his mind is one-pointed; one-starred but many-rayed,
As he takes it all in with the eagle eye that sees from far above
But can count the whiskers on a marmot.

Anyone know any good basketball poetry? Clue me in, please, I’d like to see some.

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Flickr Credit: RMTip21