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The Soccer Field in Canton, Georgia

Thom Satterlee

Friday, February 25th, 2005

1 Leave a comment on verse 1 0 It is a playing field 100 yards long and 80 yards wide. Early
morning, a man unloads a silver two-wheeled cart from his truck
and begins to chalk the field. He is holding a black rubber
handle. The two wheels squeak, but white dust falls in a steady
stream from a flap underneath. He will retrace a square, an arc,
a circle, and two dots. Because he is alone and it is quiet, he
drifts into himself, into that wavery place, the office of the mind,
where notes are forgotten and the desk turns over and all his
papers spill on the floor. Whenever he is in town or here
coaching one of the younger teams, he smiles at people. They
forget him. He is just a normal guy. When he finishes and pushes
his cart to the truck, he can’t remember walking around the
whole field, but the lines are there. He wonders if he is sad or
just in a calm place now. Where had he gone those quiet minutes
on the field, the grass bending under his boots, white lines
appearing behind him like a trail of thoughts? He decides he
likes drifting off, forgetting, being forgotten by others. And here
he has left something to play on and use up, so he can come
back again.

© 1994, Thom Satterlee

Notes

Editor’s note :

Reproduced by kind permission of the author.

Thom Saterlee is Assistant Professor of the English Department at Taylor University, Indiana, USA.

I found the poem at http://www.theglobalgame.com/satterle.htm

Thought it was good enough to share.

Source: http://footballpoets.org/poems/the-soccer-field-in-canton-georgia/