Everything is the past,
for what is, is no more,
and the future is yet to be.

Everything seemed green back then and cold
to the little boy at his first football game,
sitting next to his dad. Surrounded by,
and inundated with, the indelible smells
of cheap-ass cigar smoke and so many spilt beers,
while watching the numbers change on the
gigantic black board above the bleachers, showing
all the other scores, from all the other games,
in all the other cities. And he was in Detroit!
He was actually there, sitting next to his dad.
The Lions won that day and he was so alive,
and so in love, with everything.

Everything had turned blue by then
as the young man was sitting in the sun watching
his umpteenth baseball game, surrounded by his
childhood friend. Yes, this stadium was his
everything. It was as if he could take the whole
place into the palms of his hands, give it a good shake,
and make it fake snow. He knew every entrance,
he knew every exit, he knew every square inch,
he was in total control. That was until some years ago,
when they suddenly closed the doors - forever.

Everything was white there in his dream
where his stadium now laid in ruins,
a painful reminder of what used to be,
barely recognizable, but he knew what it was.
There was a partial shell with some pillars and posts,
and now it had somehow moved to Toledo and stood
next to his childhood home. And as he encircled the
catacombs of the tunnels and the sarcophagus of the
right-field stands, at first, he couldn't seem to find a
way in, and then, he couldn't seem to find a way out.

And all he really knew for sure, was that,
the little boy was lost.

Daryl J. Lukas

The poem "Tiger Stadium" can be found in "Two Guys Talking at The Four Horsemen," a book of poetry by Daryl J. Lukas.
This book may be purchased for $6.95 at www.ShadowPoetry.com.