Leroy — Poetry — Dan Spier

Poetry

Some people might say that I am a rhymer rather than a poet. I have had the ability to make rhyming lines fairly easily, but I like to think that my poetry has more in it than just rhyme. I love imagery–the sights, sounds, smells, feels and movements of natural things, and I try to make my poetry very concrete and real. For some reason, funerals have been a very large part of my poetic efforts, I suppose because poems celebrate a life better than mere speech. At any rate, I have included some poetry here, and I hope you like it. As always, the subject matter is very diverse.

Here is a poem I wrote while Molly, my wife, was teaching calculus. Her students had told her that they did not understand poetry: that the subject matter was so obscure, meaningless, and irrelevant. She replied that poetry could be about anything. They rebutted by saying, “Right! I suppose you could write a poem about mathematics!” Taking the challenge, she said, “Yes, you could write a poem about math.” “Let us see one then,” they countered. Molly came home and told me the story. “Is there some way we can make a poem about math?” she queried. I said, “Well, if you will help me with the terminology, I will try.” Here is what we came up with.

TRIGONOMETRY
By Dan Spier

There is nothing in life so darn hectic
As a brain in a course trigonometric.
I had much rather study invasions
Of Vandals and Huns than equations.
And especially ones like quadratics!
They’re fit only for fools and fanatics!
While my social life sits and relaxes,
My dumb brain is a blur of Y-axes.
Even tangents and points of inflection,
Make me suffer a loss of direction.
While derivatives—both first and second,
Are a little bit more than I reckoned.
When old fractions turn inverse proportions,
My sinuses go through contortions.
My domain is as strange as an ocean,
And my slope and my range? I’ve no notion!
I think radians are tires for one’s auto,
And determinants words for one’s motto.
Logarithms sound right for percussion,
And matrices good for discussion.
But my function’s velocity’s dropping,
And I sense by acceleration stopping.
My vertex’s endpoint—it dangles,
As I’m swallowed in huge right triangles.
All my maximums minimum weakly,
As my anti-log poem ends bleakly,
I guess if one thinks perpendiculous,
Trigonometry’s not so ridiculous.

This is a poem I wrote while I was head coach at Newton County High School in Covington, Georgia. An eleventh-grade football player drowned and the coaches had to say something at his funeral. I wrote this poem and read it at the service.

When Jesus called to Leroy
To climb the golden stair,
He didn't know the glory
Waiting for him there.
The football team in heaven
Is the best you've ever seen,
Every lineman and every back
Is big and fast and lean.
And angels lead the cheers up there,
Waving their golden wings,
And there's always great team spirit,
The victory praises ring.
The crowd will welcome Leroy
With a hallelujah roar,
As he checks into the game,
Wearing No. 34.
And the coach that gives the signals
Is undoubtedly the best,
For Jesus wears the coaching hat
And whistles to the rest.
The devil's troops won't have a chance
On the day of the big game,
With Leroy bustin' holes
And knockin’ demons lame.
I know we're sad to think
He won't be playing here,
But the championship that
Leroy wins is good for every year.
And he'll look down on us
And tell us in his way:
"Y’all fight hard and live for God
And you'll play for us someday."