Victory
Rent from DeepDyve- Victory
When I was twelve, I shoplifted a pairOf basketball shoes. We could not affordThem otherwise. But when I tied them on,I found that I couldn’t hit a shot.
When the ball clanked off the rim, I feltOnly guilt, guilt, guilt. O, immoral shoes!O, kicks made of paranoia and rue!Distraught but unwilling to get caught
Or confess, I threw those cursed NikesInto the river and hoped that was goodEnough for God. I played that seasonIn supermarket tennis shoes that felt
The same as playing in bare feet.O, torn skin! O, bloody heels and toes!O, twisted ankles! O, blisters the sizeOf dimes and quarters! Finally, after
I couldn’t take the pain anymore, I toldMy father what I had done. He wasn’t angry.He wept out of shame. Then he cradledAnd rocked me and called me his Little
Basketball Jesus. He told me that every cryOf pain was part of the hoops sonata.Then he laughed and bandaged my wounds—My Indian Boy Poverty Basketball Stigmata. [End Page 16]
Sherman Alexie is a poet, short story writer, novelist, and performer. Winner of the pen/Faulkner Award for Fiction, the pen/Malamud Award for Short Fiction, a pen/Hemingway Citation for Best First Fiction, and the National Book Award for Young People’s Literature, he has published twenty-four books. A Spokane/Coeur d’Alene Indian, Alexie grew up in Wellpinit, Washington, on the Spokane Indian Reservation. Alexie has been an urban Indian since 1994 and lives in Seattle with his family.
