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I've been to Fenway Park once, many years ago.
Later, I was in my parody writing phase, and someone asked me if I could parody prose as well as songs. This is one result. It incorporates my impressions of that visit, with the Mets first regular season interleague game played there serving as the background.
Enjoy,
Later
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Anne Rice Reports the Ballgame
1.
The Mets approached the old building with fear. It was secluded in the center of town, amid the cheap bars and crowded streets. But, as night began to fall, it emitted an eerie glow into the New England sky. The crowd seemed drawn inexorably toward the light, like moths to their doom. And as their team bus drew up to the gate, the word "friendly" was the farthest from the minds of the Met players. They had heard all the stories, but few of them had ever dared to enter.
They changed into their uniforms solemnly, and slowly ventured out from the bowels of the building into the artificial light that was beginning to win its battle with encroaching darkness. They blinked in disbelief. There it was. All the stories were true. The Green Monster did exist! To paraphrase Edward Albee, it was the malevolence of an erection. It had obviously been created by an architect with a deep hatred for pitchers. And they wondered to a man what impact that expanse of tin with mesh above would have on their immediate futures.
The pitchers felt fear rising in their bellies; the hitters a false sense of bravado. Soon night would fall, darkness would envelop the rest of the world outside, and the dreaded Boston bats would emerge. Only one of their hurlers, Martinez, was able to nullify bats in this place, and without a necklace of garlic. By contrast, to the Met starter Al Leiter it had been a house of horrors for his entire career.
Even the lights that started to dot the face of the Monster did not begin to allay their fears. It was a perfect home for a team that seemed to resurrect itself every decade. The locals spoke of "the Curse" which has lasted three quarters of a Century. Over that span, their fans have followed them to the brink of ecstasy, only to be plunged into the depths of despair. Yet the frenzy of their maniacal following has never waned, even to the point of destroying the lives of those players who may have disappointed them by making one small error or one bad pitch.
The blood red words on the chests of the home team blazed in juxtaposition with the Halloween orange trim on the uniforms of the visitors. But whose blood would be spilled that night? The first battle was about to begin.
The man expected to lead the Mets that night was Mike Piazza. But he was hit by a pitch from Martinez. Yet the man who replaced him, light hitting Alberto Castillo drove the first stake through Martinez’ heart. It was a home run that was gobbled up by the Green Monster. The life began to drain from the local fans. To the Mets, the smell of blood was heady and they began to revel in the carnage that was about to unfold.
The bats; the bats; the timber-nabulation of the bats was to continue all night. The Mets hit three more home runs and Boston’s own semi-mortal monster, Mo Vaughn hit two of his own. But the inevitable was never in question.
Slowly the fans began to leave the old building, to drown their sorrows one more time in the seedy pubs that lined the neighboring streets. The Green Monster had consumed one of their own that night. Soon the bats would be asleep; artificial light replaced by the coming dawn. But in the darkness of the old arena, the bats would remain, waiting for their next victims.
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