Poem: Passing beauty
July 7, 2026
It's moving, just ahead
of the players' most clever feet.
Every four years, we fill a cup,
then pour it out, a month of dreams.
Was it just last week that Bergkamp
flicked with orange elegance,
side-footing space and time?
No, he is long gone now,
off fielding sixty years.
Others follow. Messy time
melts beauty, remoulds it,
casts it always anew.
It never ages, constantly fired,
as we fade, we watchers,
yesterday's players, passing.
Twenty sips at the cup
will fill a lifetime;
held safe in keeper's hands.
PS Cottier
Photograph: Herbert Nott, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
I tend to trot this poem out when the World Cup is on, whether women's or men's. I've had to update Bergkamp's age a few times, but the pun on Messy still stands! The photograph is of Dutch soldiers playing football in Ontario, Canada (the date given is circa 1940-1949).
Tuesday poem: Après le sable
August 12, 2024
Will the Iron Lady, her ample metal skirt
spreading like the nineteenth century,
miss the glimpse of two-piece sport
when women pushed a ball over a net
planted in a sudden burst of beach?
Will she recall spectators’ stands?
Will she dream of that quick-built strand?
PS Cottier
Image by Maksim Sokolov, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.
I've been glutting on sport lately, both AFL (live) and the Olympics (at ungodly hours). I particularly liked the huge weightlifters (and the wee ones), the wrestlers, and the beach volleyball, in the wonderful stadium on the Champ de Mars. This poem is about that sport.
At least the footy is still going!
Tuesday poem: Foul
September 11, 2023
Foul I was warned about suddenly dodgy knees from stopping, ground-anchored with ball, not travelling, rose-red cheeks blooming if I mis-stepped, netball unlike free dancing. But it was my back that wrenched, pain slicing. Score forgotten, I limped and winced, green stomach threatening to disgrace the court. Later, my mother warned Be quiet about it, or we’ll get you a metal brace. The idea of steel encasing me, a permanent cage, a canary caught in inflexible grid, shut me up. I cried at night, tried to hide spasms at school. A broken bone flexing from that ladylike sport? PS Cottier
Netball was the main team sport for girls back when I was at primary and secondary school, which was a few years after that wonderful image held by the State Library in Queensland. I don’t think I actually broke my back playing the game, but I certainly twinged it!
Passing beauty: poem
January 10, 2023
Passing beauty It's moving, just ahead of the player's most clever feet. Every four years, we fill a cup, then pour it out, a month of dreams. Was it just last week that Bergkamp flicked with orange elegance, side-footing space and time? No, he is long gone now, off fielding fifty years. Others follow. Messy time melts beauty, remoulds it, casts it always anew. It never ages, constantly fired, as we fade, we watchers, yesterday's players, passing. Twenty sips at the cup will fill a lifetime; held safe in keeper's hands. PS Cottier This football poem was first published in Eureka Street, and then in broadsheet (New Zealand), no 13, Special World Cup football issue, 2014. Finally (before today!) in Boots, a new edition of Mark Pirie’s 2014 football poetry anthology, 2017. I refuse to look up how old the Dutch player Bergkamp is now! I am not the only one still suffering minor withdrawal symptoms after the end of the World Cup. Great to see Argentina win, and the pun on the word 'messy' in my poem is deliberate. I am very much looking forward to the Women's World Cup in Australia and New Zealand this year.
Image Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Between
March 19, 2020
Between
8th March 2020
Women’s T20 final, Melbourne
A perfect night —
the MCG swarming
with yellow and green bees,
flocking and buzzing and singing,
mixed in with an Indian blue.
There, I finally saw
what T20 is good for.
85,000 of us, give or take,
to watch 22 women,
bowling, fielding, swinging.
The cake was iced
as our team lifted the cup.
Then we danced to one Perry —
Ellyse, alas, side-lined,
spectating just like us.
After the fires,
where we couldn’t breathe,
and before the virus
locked so much up,
we sang and yelled and clapped.
Such lively peace between
seeming endless fires,
and a tiny foe, unseen.
PS Cottier
Already it seems like a different world from just on two weeks ago, when I was down in Melbourne for the T20 final. A brilliant performance by the Australian team. Katy Perry and the dancing cricket bats. A packed MCG. And now events with over 100 people are basically banned.
Australia had just had the worst summer in terms of bushfires, and now, looking back, this great night at the MCG seems a moment of poise before we fell over into the world of the virus. So glad that I have the memory of this night! And I can’t wait for ridiculously large crowds to reappear.
PS Cottier 