Bunts

“Bunting is a skill.” A batter is trying to bunt a really fast and moving baseball with a stick that isn’t that big. Same as taking a swing at the same fast and moving baseball, a special skill. And with these poems, Theibert also shows he has a special skill when it comes to writing about baseball. A chuckle, a grin, a nod, a catch in the throat. Reading “Bunts” is a return to the past, a walk in the present, a peek into the future. Easy on the eyes. Philip Theibert’s Bunts has left the yard.

—Rafe

Philip Theibert should win the MVP—Most Valuable Poet—for his riveting and rueful collection of original baseball poems. Bunts is a home run of a book containing poems that soar gracefully out of the park. Humor abounds: for example, a baseball game with sound effects, words from an umpire, “You drop more calls than my cell phone.” ballparks sounding more like boardroom names than stadiums. Here are relief pitchers as gunslingers, other pitchers who live on the edge, scuffed baseballs compared to the homeless, and managers who store their doubts in skeptic tanks. Go to the park with Mr. Theibert. His work is as wonderful and touching as father and young son going to the first game of the season.

—Mel Glenn, author