Hoops!

Hoops! 

By Maureen Ucles

                                      Dribbling, 

Dribbling, 

                                                  Dribbling

My Spalding basketball

against the battered,

 poor-excuse-for- a- walkway
Cracks
too numerous to count

 like wrinkles on a pitiful, putrid prune

Avoiding those pitfalls

so as
not to 

break 

my mama's back

causes me to move,

swivel, groove

unleash 

some left over swag

 like LBJ

on the 

NBA

I jab step,
spin around

ankle breaking

I am
A I

The Answer

back in the day

Hey!

Can't wait to

meet my peeps
same place
same sound
to

shoot and play

some 

serious, nasty, stupid

Hoops!

The ball spins 

elegantly

from my fleshy finger-tips

Soaring high over my noggin'

Sounds so sick to behold

Swish, swish, swish!

That sound!
Never gets old!

Ah!

Like poetry in motion

My mid range J

In all its glory

What can I say?

Sweet spot

Just right

Glides clear through the

  musty, dusty,and always rusty,
orange chipped

sorry rim

Landing ever so softly
caught then released
in the chain- linked paradise

Basket baby!

Ball!

I call for it!

Music to my enormous ears

Satellites full of delight

A smile for my sweaty face

Rhythms realized

This is definitely 

My day

My time

Ball!

Basketball

 all that  it beholds

No other game

Can compare

No other place

I'd rather be

than 

in this blackened
asphalt jungle

 in the zone

scorching, torching

for all to see

You can't guard me!

Yep!

That's me

Straight up

ballin'
Hoops!