The Breton Duet, posted a week or so ago, was full of gobbledook and left its author somewhat ashamed. The following is an attempt to make it up to at least one of the dedicatees.
Sonnet – c. Aphrodite, b. Zeus, 92.9 Megamiles
In early time and space a full-length ball,
Sensing the growing pull of gravity,
Broke to the off and went elliptical
Spawned twenty-twenty times depravity.
But cricket will outlive this godlike jest
Partaking as it does of physics’ might
Electrons spin like Dyed-Hair at his best
Rotation is the heart of subtle flight.
Consider this: the ball’s two hemispheres,
One rough, one smooth, each passing through the air,
Swinging to churn the facing batsman’s fears,
A heavy burden on his strokeplay flair.
To this equation add the moment when
Tangential ball and pitch deceive again.
NOTE. Nothing in this, I’m afraid, for anyone resident in North America. Alas I shot my bolt with baseball over a year ago.
Novel progress 22/3/10.Ch. 17: 3178 words. Chs. 1 - 16: 73,302. Comments: Clare publicised.
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8 comments:
A googly?
All the cricket I know I learned from Patrick O'Brian. I fear it was not enough.
Plutarch: Verily, I have stirred up a nationwide storm of apathy.
JuLia: Now that it truly weird. Stephen, who knows nothing about cricket, is invited to take part in a match. He rambles about the outfield looking for bugs, ignoring the proceedings, finally he joins in and - imagining the rules to be similar to those for a wild Irish sport called shinty - dribbles the ball down to the other end of the pitch and smashes down the wicket. Stick to ice hockey.
Oh nein, BB! Not apathy. I simply haven't been able to find the time to devote to the understanding of the vocab. You would think that my deep love of baseball would help somewhat, but alas ... During my time in Japan, my Aussie boyfriend tried to teach me an appreciation of cricket; it may have been one of the reasons for our breakup now that I think about it. Sigh.
RW (sZ): Never would I accuse you of apathy. There simply isn't time in your crowded life to learn about cricket. As to the similarities with baseball (I speak as a lifelong fan of the Pittsburgh Pirates going right back to the days of the beatified Roberto Clementi) one can say that bat hits ball in both but that's where the commonality ends. For one thing there's a deep philosophical difference; a friend of mine put it neatly: "In cricket a draw (ie, a tie) is not only the most likely outcome, it's the most desirable." Contrast this with the US sports apophthegm: "A tie is like kissing your sister." I am deliberately avoiding reference to the fact that you had an Aussie boyfriend; I think I must lock myself in a dark room and think about this.
Please don't spend too much time in the dark, BB! Simply a matter of height ... imagine a Germanic woman in Lilliput ... all of the Japanese guys were a good 5 inches shorter than I and the Aussies were over 3 inches taller.
Not apathetic either, except inasmuch as the arrival of a knitting commission for which the wool is so fine I have calculated will require at least 25,000 stitches and I rather wish I hadn't made the calculation, together with so many boat and related pictures, my eyes being bigger than my editing capacity, has led me to neglect most of my blogging contacts for too long.
It's very swish, and will most certainly be appreciated by the cricket aficionado when he's in the vicinity; he keeps being drawn back to the Indian 20/20 matches even though I then have to endure a tirade of despairing contempt.
He has recently found another Brit with an interest in the sport, which has taken some of the pressure off me to look as though I either know or care. Our American friend was amazed to overhear them talking about 20/20 saying 'It's just not cricket!' as he had never really believed that Englishmen actually said that.
RW (zS): As West Yorkshire textile salesmen were wont to say: never mind the length, feel the quality. How perverse of you to develop an interest in Japan, given this problematic differential. Why not the Masai? You could have adored their knee-caps.
Lucy: I'm surprised there are so many stitches in a cricket sweater; isn't the wool usually rather coarse? Mrs BB knitted me a variant once (ie, with a polo neck) and I was pleased to discover that creating the twisted ridges didn't require her to knit round corners. Instead the twisting was literally twisted with something like a toothpick. Tom deserves his confidant. France is an unfruitful place for cricket; they can't get their pragmatic minds round it. Is that your problem?
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