TGIF. The Before March-Madness Edition.

Cheap Seats, the Cincinnati Gardens, Professional Basketball, 1959


by William Matthews

The less we paid, the more we climbed. Tendrils

of smoke lazed just as high and hung there, blue,

particulate, the opposite of dew.

We saw the whole court from up there. Few girls

had come, few wives, numerous boys in molt

like me. Our heroes leapt and surged and looped

and two nights out of three, like us, they'd lose.

But "like us" is wrong: we had no result

three nights out of three: so we had heroes.

And "we" is wrong, for I knew none by name

among that hazy company unless

I brought her with me. This was loneliness

with noise, unlike the kind I had at home

with no clock running down, and mirrors.