Ah yes, the insider’s ocab in poetry. I enjoyed the sound but have no idea what you’re talking about, Bil;none at all…
Doug
> On Dec 29, 2015, at 9:26 PM, Max Richards <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> Funny to think of the details here being obscure to outsiders…
>
> Cricket not for me, but it’s been hard to avoid, and the vocab here
>
> is often bemusing - goggly I know of but couldn’t define -
>
> leggies and offices almost guessable -
>
> the cherry! joke word for that vicious hard red ball …
>
> This poem deserves a place in any anthology of poetry -
> devoted to cricket. Are there such?
>
> Max (gave up cricket in 1949)
>
> On Dec 29, 2015, at 13:29, Bill Wootton <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
>> Dud fieldsmen get captain-directed right
>> down on the fence, miles from mid-innings
>> action, when no one is likely to take
>> a swipe and test your unreliable hands.
>>
>> At change of overs, you either bolt
>> down the other end or get slight relief
>> by holding down mid-off for an over
>> where at least conversation is audible.
>>
>> Once in a blue googly, someone swats
>> a sitter to you in close and if you manage
>> to dispel your panic and actually swallow
>> the catch, you will know true gratitude.
>>
>> Normally restrained leggies and offies,
>> unlike their wild-haired, truculent
>> cousin quicks, will gather you up,
>> tousle your hair and grin goofily,
>>
>> pretending they planned the trap.
>> But mostly, fielding is a lonely business,
>> hearing distant thunks as the cherry
>> arcs off where others congregate.
>>
>> Late in the innings, you may be offered
>> another reprieve, closer to the popping
>> crease but equally isolated - deep fine
>> leg - on the off chance of picking up
>>
>> a skewed hook or a keeper's miss.
>> On TV, balls glide across bowling green
>> -like surfaces but in the suburbs, any-
>> thing can happen as balls spit and jump
>>
>> over mis-mown, crevice-cracked buffalo
>> grass. A sweep along the ground can
>> leap up and collect you in the teeth.
>> But must not fray your focus. Just don't
>>
>> let that ball get to the boundary.
>> Sorts you, fielding. You're there
>> for the duration of afternoon,
>> holding down a position.
>>
>> bw
Douglas Barbour
[log in to unmask]
https://eclecticruckus.wordpress.com/
Recent publications: (With Sheila E Murphy) Continuations & Continuations 2 (UofAPress).
Recording Dates (Rubicon Press).
Done in by creation itself.
I mean the gods. Not us. Well us too.
The gods moved into books. Who wrote the books?
We wrote the books. In whose dream, then are we dreaming?
Robert Kroetsch.
|