THE LESSON Learning to keep your nose behind the ball. Until it snaps. Otherwise a red flag thrown from the hip signals       a penalty Whistles       the play             off-side &                   an automatic loss             of       5 Yards. This determines what follows. Depending on down. Depending on distance. Depending on time remaining.       Everything depending upon...       (no particle ever defined w/o reference to all other       particles whose def'ns in turn depend on the first particles) the old man calling for his favourite       last second, long yardage play:             a halfback draw requiring skill, timing &                   some am't of guts, the runner             invariably       gets hit back of the line & my dad yells 'Bum!' Throws his hands into the air at the thot of a Hail Mary. 'You call that playing football? That's not football.       That's pissing at the moon.' My brother & I meanwhile on our feet with the crowd Follow       the ball's             breathless flutter                   into the end-zone, see the tip,             the bobble, the mad scramble,       the pile on, the referee's extended arms, TOUCHDOWN! Us joining in the roar while he sits. Forever fashionably unfashionable       knocks back a last rum & Coke             grabs us by the wrists packing, sez:                   'You figure it out. Make me sick.             Cheer for a team       that plays like a Violin.' Him leaving sixty bucks a winner       having bet BC on the points &             Saskatchewan on the spread                   swears at the traffic snarling the gate             tells us to get out of the car & move       the barricade. We slip along the emergency road       & head for daylight Breaking clean As a whistle.