Ballade of a Substitute

I've been here nearly a season now,
  Watching the regulars, day after day;
I wish some wizard would tell me how
  To break right into the game and stay.
  It isn't as if I were some thick jay,
Like a lot of those clumsy “Class B” flivvers,
  But I'm glued to the bench so hard that, say—
The seat of my pants is full of slivers.

McGill is a terrible lobbygow,
  But he's drawing a regular shortstop's pay;
He romps around like a crippled cow
  And shows the speed of a two-ton dray.
  Night after night I kneel and pray
For a chance to work with the real high livers,
  But I guess I'll sub till my hair turns gray—
The seat of my pants is full of slivers.
Clancy ought to be steering a plow
  Back on the farm near old Green Bay;
He's playing third, with his slanting brow;
  And Dugan ought to be pitching hay.
  The bulls they've made since the first of May
Would give a McGraw one million shivers,
  But it's “stay on the bench!” for Kid O'Shay,
The seat of my pants is full of slivers.

“ENVY”

Manager, pardon this mournful bray,
  But my pride is hurt and my conscience quivers;
Give me one chance in the thick of the fray—
  The seat of my pants is full of slivers.
Ballade of a Substitute

by William F. Kirk, 1910
