Baseball and Writing by Marianne Moore
The Poet Offers Her Post Game Analysis on Baseball
Apr 13, 2009
To read Baseball and Writing in its entirety, as well as other poems by Marianne Moore, visit Poets.Org
A certain patience and understanding is required; a definite attention span; a willingness to do the research; to understand the details; to expect the unexpected occurrences that can and will arise, and disrupt the flow and rhythm of the game, and your writing.
Writing is exciting
and baseball is like writing.
Art and the Zen of Baseball
The art and the zen of baseball has been widely and thoroughly examined and dissected by all manner of artists and aficionados; outside of Marianne Moore, the most entertaining purveyor being the fictional femme fatale, and poetry lover, Annie Savoy in the classic baseball movie Bull Durham (1988).
Is baseball the best of all sports by which to read and write? Can a baseball fan duck out between innings, and sneak in half a page of a book, or scribble notes, or finish writing a paragraph; or a poem?
And Now, Back to the Game
And now back to the game: It's a pitcher's battle all the way--a duel-a catcher's, as, with cruel puma paw. It's a pitcher's duel that will require all players in all positions: pitcher, catcher, fielder, batter; to execute and excel; to deliver a victory to the individual, thereby delivering victory to the team.
Ms. Moore heralds the expertise of hero Mickey Mantle as he runs down a fly ball in center field, snatching the ball off the top of the wall like a wild animal snaring something from its treetop nest.
The Stadium is an Astrium
After Ms. Moore concludes her play by play, in which she finds a way to name drop a wide array of her favorite players, from Mickey Mantle to Roger Maris to Yogi Berra to Hector Lopez; she concludes her poem with a consideration of Yankee Stadium, which was demolished in favor a newer, more modern stadium in 2008:
Studded with stars in belt and crown,
the Stadium is an astrium.
O flashing Orion,
your stars are muscled like the lion.
Alas, while the title Baseball and Writing holds the promise of an examination, a correlation between baseball and writing, in the end, Ms. Moore's poem is almost exclusively about baseball; which of course is completely understandable to any baseball fan who's tried to write while watching a game.
Baseball and Writing is from The Complete Poems of Marianne Moore
ISBN: 9781439509319
Poetry by Marianne Moore
Poems (1921)
Observations (1924)
Selected Poems (1935)
The Pangolin and Other Verse (1936)
What Are Years? (1941)
Nevertheless (1944)
Collected Poems (1951)
Like a Bulwark (1956)
O to Be a Dragon (1959)
The Arctic Fox (1964)
Tell Me, Tell Me (1966)
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