Jack McCarthy

Back Issue

It was the girl that caught my eye—

young, blond, shorts and a sleeveless top,

barefoot on the astroturf tennis court.

I was a little too far away to make out her face,

but she had all the casual beauty of the young,

a body in the wonderful no-man’s land between

cover-girl and athlete, the kind of girl who,

if they have a family softball game

at a wedding reception,

will be too busy playing third base

to try to catch the bouquet.

This girl was practicing volleyball

with a crewcut young guy

in baggy shorts and moccasins.

He would loft the ball toward her and

she’d set it back to him in a lazy arc

and he’d spike it back

and she’d try to dig it.

Sometimes she’d succeed and he’d

return it with a gentle set

and maybe she would take the opportunity to spike—

or not. They weren’t playing

by any rules that I could figure out.

The guy seemed to be teaching the girl,

and my first thought was

she had a crush on him,

that asking him to help her learn volleyball

was her way of getting him alone

the way a she-wolf tries

to cut a caribou out of the herd.

His back was to me

whatever he said carried away

on the ocean breeze

blowing across the island toward Portsmouth.

The girl chattered constantly—

coordinated, tireless, never out of breath—

from the porch where I was sitting

I couldn’t make out her words

but her voice had all the happiness

of the last days of a golden adolescence

before anything has happened.

Once, picking up the ball,

she held it in front of her,

arms akimbo, reminding me of our

football coach’s speech to us

after we got destroyed in our first game.

"I can see we’re going to have to start

from scratch. Gentlemen, this is a ball."

But then the girl broke the connection

by tossing in a few dance steps that

coach would never have attempted.

Once, telling a little story between sets,

she slipped the ball under the front of her top

and looked, for a few moments, pregnant.

Often she laughed.

Across the water, over Portsmouth,

the sun was going down slowly,

as it does around the solstice, grudgingly,

pink behind a low-lying line of clouds,

turning to gold the wisps that hung above the bay.

A brass choir serenaded us from the porch

of the hotel next door: Mood Indigo,

A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square.

The boy was so patient with the girl

that I changed my mind:

he was the one in love with her.

Set, set, spike, chatter.

I keep hearing the word, "like."

The slow encroachment of the dark

has no effect on them.

I remember playing baseball as a kid on long

evenings like this, the first week of summer vacation,

two against two in the big back yard.

How it would grow dark so slowly

that young eyes could accustom gradually,

and the game would never end till some adult

called out to us that it was pitch dark

and we’d look around and it was true.

It must have been like that

for this boy and girl:

set, spike, set, set, spike,

retrieve, chatter, "like."

The brass choir is now on to When I’m 64.

I remember how sweet and funny and ephemeral

that song seemed when it came out,

how very young we all were.

Now that I’m 63, it takes on

a whole different meaning.

Set, set, spike,

retrieve, chatter, laugh.

They’re still going,

and I admit that once again

I have to start from scratch

that I have no idea

who might be in love with whom at this moment—

but I’ll be very surprised

if it takes even a week

before each is in love with each.

I’m ready to stop writing now,

I hear that old voice calling,

"Jack, it’s pitch dark out there."

I can hardly see the paper any more,

and still they play.

This is a ball,

and they

are dancing.

                        Jack McCarthy

                        Star Island

                        6/18/02