August & All Those Dreams We Had

Upon his mother's command
he plodded to bed
the seventh-inning-go-ahead-miracle
still resonating in his head.

He slept in his beat up sometimes lucky cap,
slept through the August heat
and then the summer squall,
even the rattling of the gutter outside his window failed to wake him
from wonderful October dreams. His team’s slump had ended. The drought was over. The magic was back. 

In the morning he came creaking down the stairs at half a trot
adjusted his beat up sometimes lucky cap
and settled in to watch those last two innings
faithfully recorded, to raise his orange juice
and tip his cap to a bullpen
that surely locked it down.

As I passed him on my way to coffee
I smiled and cringed in equal amounts
at the hopeful, innocent face of the doomed.