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Never These Men
Certain individuals find a singular moment in life used to portray them and/or define them, if not basically brand them. In the world of sports, particularly baseball, this practice is raised to a level that is questionable at best, laughable in most instances and blatantly unfair as a rule. The sports media, along with a growing portion of the general public that refuses to form their own opinions, goes to extremes to constantly relive an individuals weak moments. Curiously, they often then close their ridiculing diatribes by mentioning that labeling a particular person is really unfair. In Never These Men, Thomas Porky McDonald, whose previous works stressed the notion that a game like bas...
Poet in the Grandstand
In the area of ballpark hopping, there have been a number of accounts written, recorded or talked about in recent times, sometimes for a cause or others just as a gimmick. Through Poet in the Grandstand, poet and writer Thomas Porky McDonald gives us a most unique twist on a preoccupation which has grown in the past few decades, in the wake of the closings of classic old yards and the birth of the more entertainment and nostalgia driven open-air parks. From his first trip in 1990, to the fabled Comiskey Park of Shoeless Joe Jackson, Bill Veeck and the Go-Go Sox, on through to the 2010 opening of Minnesotas fabulous Target Field, featuring the modern M&M Boys, Joe Mauer and Justin Mourneau, M...
At a Loss to Eternity
In direct contrast to the plethora of winning is everything material that has incrementally grown since the 1990s, Thomas Porky McDonald, poet and writer, offers up At a Loss to Eternity, an admittedly arbitrary look at a number of fine baseball teams that, as the subtitle states, Didnt Win it All. Spanning from the early days of the modern World Series Era to the present, McDonald attempts to enlighten those who are willing, as well as those seemingly scarred by the burgeoning attitude that everyone is a loser except the one that wins the ultimate Championship. League Champions who lost the World Series, like the legendary 1906 Tinker to Evers to Chance Chicago Cubs or Milwaukees Brew Crew ...
And These Thy Gifts
The seventh collection of poetry to be released by Thomas Porky McDonald, And These Thy Gifts: Poems 20072009, contains another five-book set of unique material. In Theresa, Red and Serenity, the self-styled ramble poet began an arc that would permeate throughout the entire volume. Pieces like God through the Lens of a Kaleidoscope, You Wonder Where Were At, and These Thereafters all spoke of the current world, in relation to a world that once was. Where is My Spy? and Irish Girls in Waiting cited friends McDonald had made in his two decades working in NYC Transit, and Incident on Blake Street, Inside the Crawford Grill, and Is Heaven Such a Place? touched on the ballpark. In book two, Conte...
Vespers at Sunset
The sixth collection of poetry to be released by Thomas Porky McDonald, Vespers at Sunset: Poems 2005-200 7 sees the poet alternately reaching back and looking forward, with the usual five-book format along For The ride. Up first is the Fat Parrot Diaries, a volume which contains a number of reflective pieces, like "Deuce" and "47," about Frank Brady, a friend whom McDonald has alluded to often in the past. The passing of Civil Rights icon Rosa Parks inspired the impassioned verse "The Buses Won't Be Running in Heaven Tonight" And The growing specter of aging exballplayers spurred the longing ode "As Those Years Deplete the Roster." Diaries is complemented by its immediately succeeding set, ...
Downtown Revival
The second collection of poetry to be released by Thomas Porky McDonald, Downtown Revival: Poems 1994-1997, covers the poets most focused and (arguably) prolific period. Written directly after returning to Downtown Brooklyn following a protracted suspension from work, Homestand opens this collection with a number of personal pieces. For Ever Friends, All These Eternities and Single Santa Fe Car, as well as the title piece, show the poets appreciation for both the concept and the reality of home. McDonald continues in this vein in Trolley Tracks, another collection that speaks to the inner soul of the man. She Smiles For You Ever, Once Upon a Time on a Platform and As the Pink Grayer Grays li...
Children of Hope: The Story of Le Minh Dao
Major General Le Minh Dao was the Commander of the 18th Infantry Division of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN). At Xuan Loc, he became the ground commander during the final Battle for Saigon. A highly respected officer, known for his dogged determination, he held off the North Vietnamese for three weeks in April of 1975, before the ultimate fall of Saigon on April 30th. Dao was captured and spent 17 years in so-called “re-education” camps, before being released in 1992 and then given political asylum in the United States in 1993. In Children of Hope, The Story of Le Minh Dao, Michelle Chen, one of Major General Dao’s nine children, tells her father’s tale, through audio tapes recorded with him in his later years. In addition, the story of the rest of her family’s escape to freedom, through her own recollections and those of her mother and her oldest sister, is relived. The thoughts of two American military colleagues of her father conclude a moving firsthand account of life in Vietnam before, during and after the Fall of Saigon, a world event that touched so many lives.
The Cooperstown Symposium on Baseball and American Culture, 2017-2018
Widely acknowledged as the preeminent gathering of baseball scholars, the annual Cooperstown Symposium on Baseball and American Culture has made significant contributions to baseball research. This collection of 15 new essays selected from the 2017 and the 2018 symposia examines topics whose importance extend beyond the ballpark. Presented in six parts, the essays explore baseball's cultural and social history and analyze the tools that encourage a more sophisticated understanding of baseball as a game and enterprise.
A Walk in the City
A random poem, written on a birthday years before, finds a new life when a series of interrelated profiles come together in a most unexpected way. This is what constitutes A Walk in the City, writer/poet Thomas Porky McDonalds New York City travelogue. A compilation of pieces written originally for an internal website at his workplace in New York City transit, this volume shares brief, yet effective vignettes on a number of various sites in the citysome famous, and others hardly on the radar. It is dedicated to the average tourist and/or the lifetime New Yorker. McDonalds love of the place hes called home for his entire life comes across most vibrantly. Though the outer boroughs are touched ...
After the Dream Poems: 2009-2011
The eighth five-book collection of poetry by poet and writer Thomas Porky McDonald, After the Dream: Poems 2009-2011, brings the author even closer to home than in his previous work, with a thought to where the world is headed. The title poems for each of the five books in the mix, Born in the City, The Class of No Return, Touched by Life, Back to Astoria and What Lies Ahead, all speak of a man still searching to incorporate his early life into the realities of the 21st Century. Other notable pieces from each collection include “Friendships to Eternity,” “Together One, as Always” (City), “While the Leaves Blew,” “Always too Old to Change Anything” (Class), “When the Game Simply Took You Away,” “I’ve Never Forgotten About Friendship” (Life), “Scenes From a Lost Neighborhood,” “When Fear Overrides Our Humanity” (Astoria), “Needed in the Land of the Needy” and “A Glimpse of Bernadine” (Ahead). A solid entry from the still wandering and wondering balladeer.
