Foot Faults: Tennis Poems by Roger Sedarat (David Robert Books, August 2016).
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Saying Goodbye to my old Djokovic Shoes
One year and all front tread is gone.
I’ve washed the inserts. They still smell.
Since clay court matches, when I put them on
Red clouds rise up. My feet in hell
Of ripped out souls. (I’ve tried strong glue;
It doesn’t last). They lost their squeak
From footwork on hard courts. One shoe
Tongue’s frayed as if it tries to speak
But can’t. The Arabs have a word
For objects given character
By long term use. This loss must hurt
Because I know the wear and tear
Belongs to my long-blistered calloused feet
That suffer from so much painful defeat.
On Seeking Revenge in Intermediate Tennis Clinic
There was a Brit player named Neil
Who took me down 40 to nil.
He said I can’t hit,
So I called him a shit,
Then served at his balls till he kneeled.
Professional Regret
“I wish I would have been a tennis pro,”
My friend Paul tells me when we’re hitting balls.
“In mid-life crisis now, some things I know
I wish I would have been. A tennis pro
Lives on his past at country clubs as coach.”
With no retirement plan, I covet Paul’s.
“I wish I would have been a tennis pro,”
I tell my friend as we keep hitting balls.
When Gabriel Garcia Marquez played tennis…
the ball hung overhead in humid air,
his index finger directing flight
beyond tropical birds he knew by name,
over Macondo trees, their roots stretched
through centuries, winding like tendrils
of syntax across the rain forest
where ghosts of guerilla fighters machete
into sugarcane and wildflowers, a palette
of blood-syrup over crushed ice
at carnivals, children with tails swinging
from branches, their mouths stretching
down like the ball the old man smashes
open at last, sending a yellow army
of butterflies into the mountains,
an Aracataca sunset hatched
from the frenzied racket
in the author’s mind.
Coaches
Amir one summer taught me follow through
By showing him my handle’s “W.”
That fall in an advanced adult ed clinic.
This old pro shot me down (burned out cynic).
Then in a winter class I took indoors
John showed me how to whack ground strokes with force.
The college kid that spring became the best.
He taught me more, while charging me much less.
Now my year round one’s meaner than them all.
He screams, “Hey Grandma, don’t just push the ball!”