F**k you, Shakespeare!
—Pete Rose towards Jim Bouton
After the publication of Bouton’s book, Ball Four

If There Was Required Reading for Baseball By Matthew Johnson

The Baseball World was irate that Jim Bouton 
Spilled their secrets and took readers
Behind the curtain regarding its game.

The players were upset that the Boy Scout image
They put on, evaporated behind the instances
Of cursing, hangovers, and philandering. 

The front offices were upset a spotlight
Was cast on their sport, and no amount of home runs or strikeouts
Could wipe away the blemishes from their window dressing. 

The journalists and beat writers
Were jealous that a worn-down pitcher’s words
Were more impactful than all of their columns put together.

Ball Four chomped at the mythology and pedestal,
And the Baseball World didn’t like
That the gods were brought down to our level.

They were upset that this run-of-the-mill pitcher showed everyone,
That behind the chiseled physiques and contracts with multiple zeroes,
That these athletes are like the rest of us, always a little scared. 

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Matthew Johnson, author of three poetry collections, including Too Short to Box with God (Finishing Line Press), has had his writing appear in The London Magazine, Roanoke Review, and elsewhere. Managing editor of Portrait of New England, he is also poetry editor for The Twin Bill. https://www.matthewjohnsonpoetry.com/.