Welcome to Poetically Yours. This segment highlights poets from northern Illinois. Today’s episode features Carol Obertubbesing.
Obertubbesing grew up in Union City, New Jersey and saw the New York skyline every day of her life until she left. In 1969, she became part of the first coed class at Princeton University. She said that was the defining event of her life.
The Princeton Alumni Weekly published an article she wrote about her experience as one of the first women to attend Princeton. She returned to Princeton almost every year for reunions and other events and now serves as Regional Vice President for the Class of 1973. In 2019, she organized a national conference held in Chicago to commemorate the 50th Anniversary of Undergraduate Coeducation at Princeton. Last year, the University gave her the Distinguished Service to Princeton Award.
Obertubbesing has served on the Board of the Woodstock Folk Festival since 1993 and has organized the festival’s virtual performances for the past two years.
She’s worked in public TV and radio. She was the Director of Outreach at WGBH, and at PBS she was the associate director of the Elementary and Secondary Service. She said she is an avid listener of public radio. This is her poem “An Ode to Baseball.” It was written about Willie Mays when he was alive.
I sit on Grandpa’s lap
Fascinated by #24, the “Say Hey” kid from Alabama
The amazing catch, the stolen base, the soaring home run
Please, Grandpa, take me out to the ball game.
Grandpa dies when I am 6, the Giants move across the country
But the love affair endures
Mays, Marichal, McCovey continue to create baseball magic
Daddy, take me out to the ball game.
The World’s Fair opens a whole new wonderful world
Next to it a new temple of baseball arises
Not the famed Polo Grounds or Ebbets Field, say the elders
But now Dad can take me out to the ball game.
Shea goes from new to historic
As Willie returns to New York
I can now see the greatest player of all time
When Dad takes me out to the ball game.
This baseball “giant” retires
I move to Boston
Yaz, Rico, Carlton, Luis, Dewey, Jim, Fred, and Eck become new heroes
As my husband takes me out to the ball game.
On to the “Friendly Confines” - revered Wrigley Field
I hear of Ernie, Billy, Fergie, Ron, and Andre
Then on May 6 ’98, I become part of history with Kerry
On this birthday when I took myself out to the ball game.
The crowd enters, there’s a parade on the field
We sit in the bleachers, the ball rushes toward us
The basset howls, the beagle joins in - home run for the White Sox
Then dogs and people join in singing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.”
Each time I enter the hallowed walls
I hear “Peanuts,” “Cracker Jacks,” “Beer here”
The organ plays, a hush, then the crack of a bat, the roar of the crowd
I stand to sing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.”
Scully, Barber, Garagiola, Gowdy, Uecker, Brickhouse, and Hawk
Brought the game to those at home
Their voices carrying explanation, hesitation, frustration, and jubilation
And Harry sang “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.”
I travel for the beauty of the park and the joy of the game
The skyline at Three Rivers, dogs catching balls in San Francisco Bay
From the South Side of Chicago to the majestic Rockies to the Hall of Fame
Baseball unites us as we sing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.”
As we return to the Year of the Rabbit
Where it all began for Willie and for me
Let’s salute America’s oldest living baseball player
And join together in singing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game
