listening to a basketball game

when a basketball sneaker

stops suddenly on the

polished and painted floor

it makes the sound

a marmot uses on

mountain tundra

to warn his children:

i am near

close your eyes when fans

drum their feet on bleachers

in the tense moment

before a free throw

and you’ll hear the waterfall

i found in an autumn mist

where a glacial lake decided for once

to fly to the sea

a basketball passing through net,

a servant of gravity

and collective hope,

sounds like a single flake of wind

snatched from a summer storm

in ponderosa pines

and stretched between two red pins

behind glass at the museum

the sound of curses
raining on opponents and refs
like hailstones...that i've never heard
in the woods