“These people don’t appreciate what they have: time to go to ball games.”

Stadium Traffic
by Daniel Donaghy

You’re on your way home
when a thousand cars
pour onto Broad Street:
the ball game’s over.
No one’s going anywhere soon.
It’s mid-July: eighty and humid.
You smell like all the crappies in the Delaware,
wear the ache of dock crates in your back.
Your buddy lost two fingers tonight
to a jigsaw: boss said go home early,
stay late tomorrow night.
These people don’t appreciate
what they have: time to go to ball games.
You get out among blaring horns
and hustlers hawking T-shirts,
walk the yellow lines like a tight rope,
arms out for balance,
all the way to the corner and back.
Broad Street still as a parking lot,
wound tight as a fist.
You pop the trunk, fish a beer
from your cooler, and pound it.
Back in your car, the radio’s
recapping the game:
your team pulled one out
they would have blown last year.
You’ve blown the last year working
nights while your lady works days.
Night work means bad lighting,
and you’ve had enough close calls.
You’ve had enough overtime.
You’ve had enough.
Something has to give.
Somewhere in the distance a dog
is barking, a husband is coming home.