Born on November 22, 1967, in Summit, New Jersey, Mathew V. Spano grew up in Hillsborough, NJ. He was introduced to baseball by his father who “played semi-pro for the New York Giants, hit against Satchel Paige, and shook Babe Ruth’s hand.” Mathew played little league, but says he “mostly grew up playing Wiffle Ball with my brothers in our suburban backyard. We played fast pitch, used a baseball bat instead of a plastic one, and for a backstop we stood an old wheelbarrow on end with the handles facing skyward. I remember the ‘CLANG!’ that accompanied each strike. We also played softball in the street with the neighborhood kids, and unintentionally broke our neighbors’ windows, dented their garbage cans, and fractured the tail lights on their cars. We had very compassionate neighbors. Recently, I started a softball team at the college where I work. I play center field and hit third in the lineup.” As a kid he liked the New York Yankees: “We didn’t go to many games, but we watched them on TV and listened to Phil Rizzuto and Bill White. My favorite players were Ron Guidry and, later, Don Mattingly.”
Spano learned about haiku in grammar school and again in graduate school. His first published haiku appeared in 1996 in The Piedmont Literary Review, his first baseball haiku in 2005 in Modern Haiku. He received a PhD in comparative literature from Rutgers University and now teaches at Middlesex County College in Edison, NJ. He and his wife have two children and besides playing ball and writing haiku, he likes hiking, fly-fishing, and playing the piano.
alone
in the autumn night
the home run ball
late afternoon
the pitcher’s curveball drops
into the shadows
radio static
somewhere in the muggy night
a ballgame
the dark stadium
moths and fans disperse
into the night
a chill wind
whistles through the bleachers
the locked equipment box