Between the pitcher’s fish-eyed stare
and the catcher’s nail-polished signs,
an invisible line stretches
tension over time and the heads
of thirty thousand spectators,
who rise to stand upon it.
Like high-wire walkers, they feel it
from their feet up to their ears,
ringing with the roar of voices
rubbed raw as their own; their own now
lost in the pitch of this ocean
that’s carried them from March training
to what may be the season’s final play.
Suddenly, the silence of one held breath.
The catcher sets. The umpire squats,
peering over his shoulder. Through
their masks, they watch the pitcher,
rearing back, kicking the sky,
fingers locked on the moment’s seams.