Opinions | Columnists
Ode to the weeping willows
Crack! Not crash, bang, or boom, but crack! Crack went the willows. Fissures gaped.
- By Kevin Martin, Special to Gulf News
- Published: 01:06 January 17, 2008
Crack! Not crash, bang, or boom, but crack! Crack went the willows. Fissures gaped.
And into the void of black sportsmanship, sucked as into a black hole, went cricket's smiling visage, leaving behind its scowl, its foul howl of protest.
Crack, it resounded, obliterating the sobbing, throbbing, sniffling, pleading plaints. How's that? How Is That? On bended knees. Please? Unmoved, unblinking, unshaken, 22 yards apart - like Scylla and Charybdis - batsman and umpire.
The space between them the turbulent Indian Ocean. Five bowlers up the creek without a paddle. Oar, my god, the nick in Sydney was heard in India, for crying out loud, weeping willows! But no, Scylla and Charybdis stand resolute.
Immovable. Help, we're drowning in these dire straits of frustration, sinking deeper ball by sweating ball. Those on the side of fair play, please, raise - not a hand - just a finger.
That will do. Render him out when out. Not 'in' when out. Or out when he's in. Oh, I see, gentle passing wind that whispers its message.
'Out when he's in' is being reserved for us hapless visitors? For a chap called David? No? Oh, okay, for one moment the image of us as slingshot Davids flitted across my mind. But no, I got you now. Not David, but Dravid.
Couldn't hear you clearly the first time, comrade wind, above the palaver and the quick singles of guilty, scampering feet. Out when in. That's one way of knocking The Wall over.
Another brick (in The Wall) won't help if the ump sticks his finger up and the bowler pats him, 'Well done, mate', on the shoulder.
A Wall is impervious to hardened red leather kookaburras, flying incessantly into it at blink-and-you-miss-it speeds. That, after all, is The Wall's diet.
A resplendent feast of shiny red kookaburras. But you want to knock it down, give it a finger. Just one digit, index to heaven, down goes The Wall.
Up go the slips like a gleeful hedge hiding behind it. Hooray! And crack! That vile sound once more. Only louder, this time. For that is also the sound a reputation makes when it disintegrates. Into a million willow splinters.
Feet of clay
Role models with feet of clay. Crack. Heroes worshipped on pedestals. Champions with heads in the rarefied atmosphere, too high to see what's below. Vertigo?
No, unbeaten pride. Stinking pride, even, some say. Pride that has no hands to shake. Pride that has, however, a fall. And the willows weep. And the scars are deep. And the stench will keep men from their sleep.
But in due time, mature minds, because of the breadth of their horizon, journey on, dressed in designer clothes provided by Forgive & Forget.
Onward, to a brighter tomorrow. With hope. Only the bitter dwell in the past. Form is temporary; class permanent. Perhaps Mahendra Singh Dhoni's bat will sing in Perth.
Mahendra's middle name is a Singh, after all. Sing us a song a century long. Then all will be right with the world that's been wronged. Perhaps is a hopeful word. Perhaps out of the pits of despair a new light will emerge.
The light of humility, of grace, of fairness. Maybe the headstone on the pit, like an epitaph will read, 'Here lies interred one rare ugly day.'
Perhaps millions of us who've tangoed with our own 'one ugly day' will emerge better equipped, armour-plated against future ugly days that, like bully boys, love to threaten.
If we can become experts at burying the bad moment, instantly, then what's left can only do our welfare immeasurable good. It cannot be wrong to hope for that.
Out of the charcoal blackness of a cricketing moment we can sketch a map leading to greater hope. Dark moments in history are, occasionally, needed.
There is a purpose to be found in them. For they are the moral compass points from which we draw fresh bearing.
Kevin Martin is a journalist based in Sydney, Australia.
Share this article
More from Columnists
More from Opinions
Popular in Opinions
-
Opinions
Speak Your Mind: Tough love
What ways do you use to discipline your child?
Opinion Editor's choice
-
Obama has lost sight of centre
The US president needs to show voters he is listening, even if his allies in Congress are not
-
Building a knowledge society
Arab Knowledge Report examines the current state of Arab knowledge
-
Trust is the issue with Iran
Resolution is unlikely because of the lack of faith between the 5+1 Group and Tehran
