~ Delta Poetry Review ~

William Snyder Jr.

The Stuff of Sticks

Westwood Park this afternoon and clear

and dry—well, dryer than it's been—

the Florida sun a-spiral down through pine

and oak and Spanish moss and onto, look—

basketball courts. And a bunch playing—

an older guy, thirty, thirty-five,

six foot three if an inch, a teenage

boy or two, more boys younger still,

and a girl, stick-like, legs and arms—

prancing, running, skinny dreads

catching up behind. She twirls, dribbles

through her legs, behind her back—

controlled, fearless—when she has the

ball—boys shooting, dribbling around,

passing amongst themselves. The older guy

gets a pass—he's the pivot—and stick-girl

breaks for the hoop down under—

a backdoor play. Now I'm behind the pole

and I see her catch the ball, lift her

left leg up, push with her right, up,

come down, follow through. But she's

missed. She sighs, moans—I hear her

from the walk. The guy smiles at me—beard,

mustache, broad high cheeks, face lit like

the sun above, like noon—like a child's own

crayoned sun might shine. He smiles at me—

because I've seen—and I give him

two thumbs up—he's fed that girl, their

stellar play. I walk on, delighted—

like the man must be—maybe the girl is too,

though the missing more important to her

just now than the play itself—she's missed

after all. I look back and she shoots

a long one, dribbles, the best of everyone

out there and somewhere deep   

in the pith—the twig of her—she knows.

William Snyder has published poems in Atlanta Review, Poet Lore, and Southern Humanities Review, among others. He was the co-winner of the 2001 Grolier Poetry Prize; winner of the 2002 Kinloch Rivers Chapbook Competition; The CONSEQUENCE Prize in Poetry, 2013; the 2015 Claire Keyes Poetry Prize; Tulip Tree Publishing Stories That Need To Be Told 2019 Merit Prize for Humor; and Encircle Publications 2019 Chapbook Contest. He is retired from teaching writing and literature at Concordia College, Moorhead, MN.