THE LOSER

THE sun withheld its light that day; that night the stars were dim; The portent of the earth and sky was ominous for him; There was no gladness in the world; the fields held no delight; The day of all his joys dissolved and melted into night; He rubbed his pitching arms and felt the muscles rise and fall; He wondered what the cruel fate that lost the game of ball; He wandered idly by the brook, forsaken and alone, To be a hero nevermore, unsung, unwept, unknown. ’Twas only yesterday he was the idol of the team! Those cheers and loud hurrahs he heard—could they have been a dream? They called him Tim the Tiger then! Small boys by scores he saw To bear his glove, his coat, his shoes, with gratitude and awe. With joy they saw his arm laid bare—that mighty arm and brown That wound itself about his head and mowed the batsmen down; And when he went upon the field, the mighty cheer for him Showed how their hopes of victory were all bound up in Tim! It was but yesterday he bore the laurels on his brow, But who, alas! is there so low to do him honor now? His heart swells, bursting in his chest; the heart so bruised and sore; Could he but go back on the field and pitch that game once more! The tears fall from his eyes like rain, the hot and angry tears, No sorrow has he known like this in all his fifteen years; How will he meet the Tigers now? How look intothe eyes Of those who staked their all on him and saw him lose the prize? To school he walks secluded ways where once with pride he strode, With awestruck youngsters all about, the middle of the road; Far from the madding crowd he stands upon the playground there His honors fallen like the leaves in Autumn’s frosty air; A humble Tiger is he now, and small boys pass him by With cruel sneers where once he heard the cheers ring shrill and high; And Reddy Blake, the Cyclone Curve, is pitcher forthe team, While he’s but the somnambulist of a quick-vanished dream!