In the continuing project for my beautiful and beloved eldest daughter, Twilight Zone Season 1; Episode 27 reconceived as a poem and on wish that she might always believe in the magic of love in a young girl’s heart:

The Big Tall Wish
by Michael Romani

In that middle ground between science and magic
There in that place between happy and tragic
Bolie Jackson prepares for this comeback fight
Hoping that he as an underdog might win this night
Saint Nick's Arena will spotlight this tiger-ish relic
Of what was and still is just a little idyllic

Too many pieces of the boxer's youth left behind
Are revealed in that hard mirror that is his mind
A scarred face stares in discouragement back
Chasing the dreams of taking the tiger into the black
This fighter wears his scrapbook on his face
Every painful step taken at this one man's pace

Every painful moment has been cut into his flesh
A chronology begun when he was young and fresh
Bolie recounts every knock taken in every bout
It has filled his history with very little doubt
He knows in his bones, it has all been a fuss
For this tired old man trying so hard to catch his bus

His arms are heavy and his soul heavier still
All he has left to go on is his broken spirit's will
And that bus, it left already; so very long ago
Legs like rubber; wind gone; tonight, it's on with the show
He tells the young believer his broke down, tired story
But young man believes and still hangs on the tiger's glory

With a snap of his fingers, the boy speaks up
He's dreaming of his hero drinking from the winner's cup
His plan is he'll make a wish, a big tall wish
And this wish is the wish that will bring a new finish
After all, Bolie is his very good and close friend
On that the boy filled with wishes will always defend

Big tall wishes are the very most of the important kind
And those that wish these are a very special sort of find
Little boys with their heads filled with the best of dreams
Should never find out there are such magical things
The disillusioned find a world made only of concrete
And that an expression of wishes should be at best discrete

Every passerby wants Bolie to finally have his win
But not near as much as the young dreamer does again
In back of the ring, the fixer speaks of two rounds
While Bolie cannot stomach the stench of these foul sounds
The fixer puffs his cigar and just smiles at his own jest
As the boxer's self righteous anger does the rest

Two strikes stand against the little boy's hopeful magic
A boxer with suddenly busted knuckles is nothing but tragic
Little more than a human punching bag enter the arena ring
Despite broken knuckles, he's too proud to avoid the sting
The predictable fight finds time stopped on a believer's prayer
And suddenly, on the canvas the other man is laying there

Two different kinds of memories of the same fight
Two different versions of magic that same night
But there is no truth in something that is fake
Bolie thinks on that and it's something he cannot shake
Maybe he had been hit so hard that the hurt was gone
Or, maybe a little boy had wished his big wish once upon

Rooftop recount of the bout, the champ with young Henry
The boy looks away shyly turning from his hero, Bolie
A tall, perhaps the tallest wish that he might wish ever
Given like some sort of fairy tale; unworried about being clever
Bolie tells his young friend blow by blow of his history
Taking away belief and faith and every ounce of... mystery

If you don't believe then no kind of magic can ever come true
When you cannot believe well then it just can't come through
And there he is again on his back, knocked flat down
Looking up at the light and wearing the loser's sad sack frown
The world of reality had been smashed up into this face
Taking away anything but his known place, a place of disgrace

A sleepy boy talks still dreamily of his hero with pride
Taking Bolie's loss all within his full little boy's stride
As they say good night, the boy says something truly tragic
He has grown too old for wishes and there will be no more magic
The problem you see is there are not enough people who believe
No more second chances are left for those who might need a reprieve

(c) July 25, 2017  Michael Romani
All Rights Reserved