Hyperballad

In this game of titans, there is only one victor while the other is left to wonder how the universe became so small:  30 feet by 30 feet laterally while the squares that define your territory mock you with their lazy chalked lines.

You have the baseline, named thus as much for its role as the starting point, your foundation, as it is for the hollow growl coming from the instrument of so much peril and anticipation.  From the back the legs are screaming, the muscles are taut.  The body is a throb that pulsates in hot yearning, a blood filled vessel that beats, waiting to shift.  For as much charade as is found in a bounce, the body tells the spectators that humans are a ticking timepiece, marching from zero to 40 in as much time as it takes a heart to break.  And it does --each time a line is crossed, each time the net that traps you in your earthy cage vibrates with the sting of another missed opportunity to make your enemy blink, each time the muscles in fingers and arms give way to the imperfection of timing, a heart misses a beat.  In this is the quandary of time, the atom that processes left and right making rhythmic steps towards the edge of a clay or grass or concrete cliff.  There are moments when you wish to jump off.  There are times when you're simply pushed.  It's in these moments of insecurity when a human decides to fly or succumb to the shatter below.  Only a chosen few have managed to mock gravity and give new meaning to air.