Hawks Embrace Their Young

After our season-opening victory over the Houston Rockets, Greg Oden gestured for me to approach his locker.

Smiling, Greg showed me a site on his laptop and declaimed, “Season your admiration for a while, Spaniard, and listen with an attentive ear so that I may deliver this marvel to you. Behold, the poetry of Rashad McCants!”

Rashad McCants? I had detected no hints that the erstwhile Rocket was a man of letters in our previous matches. But his haughty on-court demeanor masks a poetic soul! For these are the lines he wrote in homage of a fellow player whom he has greatest admirations for:

He came to me with open arms, like a hawk embracing his young,

and he fed me food out his mouth but I was starving for knowledge.


the type of knowledge that can’t be fed by hand or voice, but by heart.


so when he spoke he touched my soul, and my soul would smack me if I didn’t listen the words he spoke weren’t for the ears to hear.

because his words were real, it’s hard to hear the truth when lies are so loud.


I put my earphones on so I can hear nothing and see everything.


lies could never steal my attention when he…he…spoke.

The eyes never lie

and when he spoke he wore no glasses

he wanted me to see the truth, which was?

that everyone wears glasses to protect lies, truth? glasses? lies? 
sounds like earth, sounds like humans, sounds like America.
 but if that’s so where is he from?

not from here, he has no glasses!
 there was an aura, a light, a truth, about him.


special? never. different? maybe. human? impossible.

so I asked him one question to expect one answer.


when you walk and talk and teach how come everyone can stare at your light, your aura, your truth?


because we are the same.

Can you guess the desired object of McCants' sentiments? No, not Khloe Kardashian, his one-time paramour and current spouse of Lamar Odom (above). Rather, McCants was speaking of Kevin Garnett!

Greg Oden foto from his selfsame blog.