Gordon Hayward has left the Utah Jazz to play for the Boston Celtics. I am not, per se, a Jazz fan. But as I’ve already written one ode to Gordon when he was a Utah phenom, I commiserate with them today. Please enjoy this poem about loss and death.
The poem “O Captain! My Captain!” by Walt Whitman, except it’s the poem “O Utah Gordon! My Utah Gordon!” by Shea Serrano.
O Utah Gordon! my Utah Gordon! our fearful trip is done,
The Jazz fans have weather’d every rumor, the prize they sought unwon,
The Boston port is near, the tweets I read, the people are exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the voyage was grim and daring;
But O Jazz fans! Jazz fans! Jazz fans!
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck their dreams of Utah Gordon lie,
Fallen cold and dead.
O Boston Gordon! my Boston Gordon! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up — for you the next championship banner will be flung — for you the bugle trills,
For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths — for you the shores a-crowding,
For you they call, the swaying mass of Massachusetts, their eager faces turning;
Here Boston Gordon! dear Boston Gordon!
This arm beneath your head!
It is some dream that on the parquet court,
Jazz fans’ dreams have fallen cold and dead.
My Utah Gordon does not answer, his lips are pale and still,
We grasp and hope and pull and cry, he has no pulse nor will,
The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done,
From fearful trip the Celtics ship comes in with object won;
Exult O Boston fans, and ring O bells!
But I with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Utah Gordon lies,
Fallen cold and dead.