The Gods of Summer

The Gods of Summer by George N Wallace

The seventh-grade shortstop reaches first base - safe by a hair,

now points to the heavens with gratitude. 

Some holy presence apparently saw to it that the third baseman 

would hesitate a split-second too long 

before making his throw to first.

The Gods must be busy - watching over tens of thousands of games,

T-ball to major league, making sure that somebody is rewarded 

for trying, for believing, for showing up - seeing to it that somebody wins

(and somebody loses). This omnipresence is seemingly world-wide, 

and for that matter, surely includes all the millions of hospitable 

exoplanets, in each of the billions of galaxies - wherever baseball is played.

I suppose even if you are eleven, unbaptized or

too young to have a theological explanation for bad luck, 

you can, at the very least, point to the god of hope

or the god of fair play, or some higher power soon to be understood.

After all, many big-leaguers do it – even the all-stars,

look to the far stars, their lucky stars, to the Gods of Summer (Spring and Fall).  

If your planet has multiple sacred traditions,  

you could be more specific with your pre-game or pre-pitch supplications 

and hope that in-spite-of mediocre grades and a slightly offensive walk-up song, 

that the god of your believing is all seeing and will  

grace your swing or bless your throw to first, 

   -   in which case an additional doxology may well be in order.