When Babe Ruth was hitting home runs,
Hart Crane was publishing poems no one understood.
Everyone knows what a home run is.
I’m trying to figure out if this is good.
If you danced around the bases (ones you designated in your back yard)
after snapping your wrists in a sandlot home run,
you can relate, I guess, to what I’m saying,
or maybe you remember when someone said,
“I don’t want to talk about poetry now. The Yankees are playing.”
And the fame of Babe Ruth. What do you think of that?
What do you think of sports and muscle, pushing aside the fat?
What do think of camel hair coats and fancy, shiny, cars?
Or Delmore Schwartz, the baseball Giants fan?
Do you want to read my book? It’s called “Poetry and the Man.”
Most of us are bums. Why I oughta. Say, it’s hard to write poetry that’s good.
Can’t understand that poem. Trying to figure out if this is good.
Hart Crane, Hart Crane! You jumped into the sea.
I wonder could you come back? And explain a few things to me?