Whenever my father
would take me to the ballpark,
I would open up the newspaper
the next morning
to check out the box score,
not to see the hits, runs, and errors,
which I already knew,
but to find the total attendance
and make sure my presence
had been recorded.
The way I saw it,
whatever the total,
I would be the number at the end.
So, if the figure was 24,376,
I would be the 6,
the only one to be
truly counted as an individual.
Without me in the stands,
the number would be a 5,
or if some guy came late,
it would jump to a 7.
I was the one who made it a 6.
And there was my digit
right there on the kitchen table
in black and white,
just the way the typesetter set it,
proof that I existed
and one of my earliest appearances in print.