The Base Stealer Analysis

Poised between going on and back, pulled

 Both ways taut like a tightrope-walker,

 Fingertips pointing the opposites,

 Now bouncing tiptoe like a dropped ball

 Or a kid skipping rope, come on, come on,

 Running a scattering of steps sidewise,

 How he teeters, skitters, tingles, teases,

 Taunts them, hovers like an ecstatic bird,

 He's only flirting, crowd him, crowd him,

 Delicate, delicate, delicate, delicate - now!

"The Base Stealer," a 1948 poem written by Robert Francis, provides very good insight on how to steal a base in a baseball game, using several similes, imagery, and an occasional alliteration to provide direct instruction to the base runner to ensure a successful steal.  Obviously, this poem may be slightly out of date, but this advice is still very useful for baseball players today.

The first line instructs the runner to take a lead, meaning to take a couple of steps off of the base, towards the base that you as a runner are trying to advance to, or steal, in baseball lingo. 
The rest of the first line, instructs the runner to be ready to go-both ways, back to the base or forward to the next base, as the pitcher may attempt a pick-off.  This is when the pitcher, instead of throwing towards the plate, throws to one of the bases, so that the runner can be tagged out by one of the position players.  The next line uses a simile and imagery to enhance the instruction.  The runner must be "Pulled both ways taut like a tightrope-walker."  This simile uses imagery (and perhaps exaggeration) to give the runner an idea of how taut, or stretched he or she must be to make sure running either way is easy and quick to do.  The third line uses purely imagery, once again giving the runner clear instructions, as the line reads "Fingertips pointing opposites."  The fourth and fifth lines use similes and imagery once again, "Now bouncing tiptoe like a dropped ball/Or a kid skipping rope, come on, come on."  This author tends to use commonplace actions to describe, in exaggeration, what must be done to be ready to steal a base.  For such a simple action, the author describes in detail how to complete it, and the amount of build up and suspense to the actual stealing of the base is exceptional, as very few other poets that I have seen in my life have been able to stretch out, in extreme detail, a simple, four-second action, such as stealing a base. 


The next two lines use alliteration and a simile, the alliteration being: "How he teeters, skitters, tingles, teases, taunts them."  The alliteration, in this case, provides excitement in a poem that could easily disengage readers, if they were not interested in baseball, or if they were not fast enough to steal bases.  Say this five times fast: "How he teeters, skitters, tingles, teases, taunts them."  Isn't it exciting? 
The end of the second line is where the simile comes into play, Taunts them, hovers like an ecstatic bird." The simile once again uses imagery, but this line, and the entire latter half of the poem is much more exciting than the first half, as the big moment is coming, where the runner is instructed to take off.  
The final two lines are instructions, and uses one repetition: "Delicate, delicate, delicate, delicate - now!"


This poem is highly pertinent to me and my life, as I am an avid baseball fan and player.  I am also a very quick runner, so when I play baseball, I steal lots of bases, and this poem is somewhat useful, but not overly, because it is somewhat outdated and the similes are not highly common in our world today.  Although the author provides some exciting insight on how he believes base runners should steal bases, it is too outdated for most people to understand properly.  However, I believe that the basic principles of stealing a base are there, and this poem, if updated, could become very useful for up and coming baseball players, especially base stealers.