Mario Hezonja was sitting on the team plane when he felt an inexplicable feeling overtake his body. After a few seconds spent feeling like he was being jostled by gentle ocean waves, the sensations became mental rather than physical as they directly entered his mind. Somehow feeling compelled by this strange, but soothing, sensation in his brain, he hurriedly rummaged through his backpack until he found what he was looking for: a paper and pencil. He didn’t remember putting them in there, but that didn’t matter now. The words within him were begging to escape, and through the tip of that pencil they flowed like water from a newly-opened dam.
“The Orlando Magic tried to ruin my career
With coaching incompetent and platitudes insincere
For years I toiled under that tyranny
For a rudderless franchise, do you see
That my potential was squandered by the man Skiles
And the obsolete coaching methods which he compiles
Into a manifesto titled “how to lose in the NBA”
I rue his idiocy each and every day
Frank Vogel was no better, to be sure
His success in Indiana could never be the cure
For a team with no star, no vision, no plan
Just a cast of misfits doing the worst they can
When my role was defined, I certainly did thrive
But on those teams, a consistent starting five
Could never be formed, due to everchanging goals
To tank or to win, and what of these roster holes?
Now I have escaped, and my future is bright
Into the day I emerged from that bleak, endless night
Only truth I can tell; I will never again go
To play for that pathetic team located in Orlando.”
As Mario wrote the concluding word of his poetry, the drifting, rocking sensation in his mind abruptly stopped. As if coming out of a daze, he re-read the words that he had written, and was surprised by them, as they were in much clearer English than he was normally capable of writing. Shrugging, he put the completed poem in his backpack and snuggled into his blanket, eager for a peaceful sleep on a plane that was taking him far, far away from Orlando, Florida.