Growing up in Maine, Dan McCullough became a Red Sox fan early in life: “Baseball and by extension, Wiffle Ball, were large parts of my childhood, but what really took hold were the 1975 Boston Red Sox. I wanted to be #19, Fred Lynn, playing center and making diving catches. I begged my parents to let me stay up to watch Game 6 of the Series that year. What I felt after the game was pure joy. Less than twenty-four hours later I was heartbroken. This was a recurring theme up until 2004.” McCullough played third base for his junior high team after three years in little league. “Since then,” he writes, “the pull baseball has over me hasn’t lessened—whether its the sight of the local ballfield covered in snow, or the memory of my blue mitt.” He “still tries to play a few innings of Wiffle Ball” when he can.
The poet was born on January 6, 1966, in Old Orchard Beach, Maine, a coastal town with a large amusement area, including a roller-coaster and a long pier crowded with games of chance, food stalls, and souvenir stands. Lively in summer, it is quiet in the winter. He graduated from the University of Maine in 1989 and now lives in Massachusetts, where he works as a naturalist for the Audubon Society. McCullough began writing haiku in 2000 after being inspired by the work of the Japanese haiku poet Chiyo-ni. Though most of his early writing focused on subjects from his hometown, such as bumper cars and seagulls, his first haiku was on baseball: “Spring shares its welcome / with an AM radio—/ Opening Day.” His haiku were featured in Red Moon Press’s A New Resonance 3 (2001).
entering
the batter’s box
afternoon shadows
during
the pitching change
cicadas
darkening clouds
the umpire’s voice
quickens
first lightning
the shortstop
flashes leather
staring in
the closer shakes off
the rain
rain delay
puddles on the infield tarp
widening
shooting star…
promptly picked off
second base
during
the pop-up
full moon
above
the bartender’s head
Game 7