Poem for Saturday and National Gallery Art

Lovable Losers
By Rachel M. Simon

The Chicago Cubs 1908–2015

In the hazy birth records
of the Arkansas of Europe
my Bubbie’s birth scrawled in Yiddish,
as eight days past a minor Jewish holiday
and not the week before the Cubs
most recent World Series victory, fall 1908.

Ten years since Bartman cursed his
Cubs right out of their first shot
at the National League pennant
a since-1908 champless existence.

Bartman won’t take your calls,
or any major network news organ.
But the Sun-Times published his every address
to find fans awaiting him lunch hour and bath.

To become unfamous
on Chicago’s north side when you
deflect the ball out of Moises
Alou’s waiting glove is a challenge.

We are assured—Cubs fan
Bartman’s healthy, employed,
still in Chicagoland.

Twenty years before Penicillin’s discovery
and two before the bra’s invention
the Cubs last won the Series. When
the NFL, NBA, and NHL didn’t exist.

My Bubbie a baby
hadn’t heard of America
where she’d later give birth,
or Chicago, place of her brother’s future
suicide—more camp trauma
than Cubs letdown.

Bartman holds no vendetta against Alou
despite his motherfucker hollers aimed to stands.                     

It was never Bartman’s fault, you can’t
make a double play from your seat.
Moises, you can’t tell
a little league coach not to reach for
a major league ball aimed at your heart.

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It rained for most of Friday, though it wasn't very cold and it let up enough in the afternoon for us to take a walk. Otherwise, it wasn't a very exciting day apart from a lot of squirrel activity after I filled the bird feeders; if I'd been keeping score, it was something like Squirrels 15, Birds 5. 

We did watch rerun skating and the opening ceremonies of the Winter Olympics, which I'm not sure whether I'm supposed to be boycotting or whether I'm supposed to boycott NBC or anything that makes the IOC money or everything from China, which I do anyway whenever I can buy from elsewhere. 

Here are some photos of things I love at the National Gallery of Art from December, including Chardin's The House of Cards, Vernet's Moonlight, Fragonard's Young Girl Reading, Robert's Ponte Salario, Boucher's Madame Bergeret, Oudry's Misse and Luttine, and Sargent's Setting Out to Fish: