The Glove - Poetry

This is an assignment that Cade was given for English 11. This is poem about a baseball glove. This will give universities a glimpse into the kind of student Cade Smith is becoming.

Glove - English 11

by Cade Smith

A game of catch, a league game, game seven;

all require stitches and laces and leather.

subtly unique as the hand inside.

Lefties, righties, pitchers, catchers, fielders

their tool crafted to catch, to field, to shag.

The defined details derived from it’s designer:

Rawlings, Mizuno, Worth, Wilson, Marucci.

Each with a trademark, but none change the icon.

The shape of catch on a lazy afternoon,

the shape of a ninety mile an hour pitch and

the precision it takes to paint the corner of the plate.

The pitcher’s mentality, behind his webbing:

clever, unpredictable, uncertain, unreadable.

A tool that can be very different, but is ultimately the same.

In the eighteen eighties change began

from calloused hands and leathery palms

to leather pads with simple fingers;

from crude shields to fine scalpels,

adding fingers, a pocket and webbing.

The defense anticipates the next play,

soft fabric on the back of my hand,

dust, that made its way to the tips of my fingers,

provides grip on the sweat slicked leather.

Finesse, foot work, repetition, execution.

The last out, the nail in a coffin

where reality is cemented and becomes irreversible.