Sunday, October 28, 2007

i knew Joan Baez, a poem

i knew Joan Baez
 by mike marcellino

i knew joan baez
joan baez.
i knew she would
pick
this
one,
her little sister.
joan baez
i knew she would
pick
this one.
she had a choice -
barbwire
or
bobbing 155 mm shell casing
on the Oriental River,

no number
rung sat zone
south, southeast of Saigon
the delta hell on earth,
special forces
say.
i knew joan baez
joan baez,
i knew she would pick this one,
like her little sister -
joan baez,
i knew joan baez.
i knew she would pick this one

copyright Mike Marcellino

Friday, October 26, 2007

Taipei Subway, a poem

Taipei Subway
By Mike Marcellino

Taipei Subway
Another day,
Night
Underground
White bright lights
Two guys and
Guitars
Singing
Where?
Taipei Subway.

Two guys and
Guitar
Singing
Where?
Taipei Subway.
There
No where
Nobody there.
Taipei Subway
Twins
Taipei Subway
Twins.

Pictures
In dark
4 color corners
4 color
4 color.
Taipei Subway
Twins.
Another day,
Night
Underground
White bright lights
White bright lights.
They weren’t
Supposed to be
There,
Somewhere,
Anywhere;
Early commuters,
People appearing
In a tunnel
White tile walls
Of love
Disappointed.
Taipei Subway
Twins
Taipei Subway
Twins.

Another day,
Night
Underground.
White bright lights
Taipei Subway,
Subway.
Two guys
Guitars
Singing.
Where
There
Nowhere.
Taipei Subway
Subway,
Subway
To a night game
For the
Taipei Subway Twins
Taiwan Subway Twins
4 color,
4 color,
4 color.

Copyright Mike Marcellino, 2007

Fields of destruction, a short story

fields of destruction
Even in 2007, most baseball fans know of Bob Feller, who could have been the best pitcher in baseball history if he hadn’t “walked off the mound” to join the Navy on Monday, December 8, 1941, the day after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. The mound in the diamond of Cleveland Municipal Stadium, built in 1931 and destroyed 64 years later, which just happens to be my age to date.
What not many people ever knew, except Iowans, was they called young Feller “the heater from Van Meter,” Iowa that is. Today’s population 866. The railroad tracks headed west and a farm road called R Road make a cross and that’s Van Meter.
Feller could be one of the heroes of William Casey Blake, who hails less than 20 miles or so down the road east in Des Moines. Blake plays ball in Cleveland’s new ball park. It’s called Jacobs Field, rather poetic, I think, and something like Baltimore’s Camden Yards, near the train station.
Whether Iowan Blake was named after the mighty Casey who struck out breaking a bunch of hearts I don’t know. Probably. The third baseman and a few other Cleveland Indians may be the subject of a few not exactly upbeat poems after the “Tribe” fell apartment after getting up on Boston 3-1 in the best of seven American League Championship.
Fans in Cleveland (and it will probably catch on) are calling it “The Collapse.” Cleveland sports team history is filled with bat shattering two word nationally, if not world known, epitaphs.
The Catch, the Polo Grounds , September 29, 1954.
Some think say hay Willie Mays’ An over the shoulder wide receiver style back to home plate the greatest grab in baseball history. The San Francisco Giants turned a 2-2 tie into a win and went on to defeat the Indians who put into the record books one of the best seasons in baseball history. The Giants took four straight off the Indians winning the World Series. Someone on Wikipedia says that people say that Vic Wertz drive to straight center traveled 450 feet. That can’t be possible, can it? Wikipedia, did they ever play “polo” in the Polo Grounds?
But, I am getting ahead of myself and away from the freshest Cleveland professional sports team suicides, in a 53- year- long trail of unraveling I followed until I collapsed.
I affectionately titled my story, “Fields of Destruction” because the Indians remind me of the Vietnam War era classic, “The Eve of Destruction.” I thought the song was called “Fields of Destruction,” having been in some of those fields and by Eric Burdon and the Animals rather than Barry McGuire, that I now remember as a movie with Tom Cruise about a football players’ agent that I saw part of a few times.
I was almost in Van Meter once without even knowing it’s the home of the Bob Feller Museum. Actually, Van Meter is just a few miles west along Interstate 80 from a whole Google of Super 8 motels. I have a Super 8 card somewhere. I came as close as Jimmy’s All American restaurant and bar, a place where a writer from Cleveland posing as a movie scout was immediately and continuously hugged and kissed and bought beers all Wednesday night, the only night things jump in Des Monies, I as told. Just call me lucky, but that does put some distance between me and the Indians.


Copyright by Mike Marcellino 2008