BY TONI YANCEY

The dunk is the most exciting play in basketball. I wrote this poem last year, inspired by a dunk by Michelle Snow, then with the University of Tennessee. However, it truly captures the spirit of fans at the Staples Center July 30, especially for us “ballers.” Lisa Leslie’s first dunk in professional women’s basketball at the Miami Sol-L.A. Sparks game commemorated the 30th anniversary of the passage of Title IX, which has greatly advanced gender equity in sports.

We Too Are Ballers

She rose this week
To the rim
Above the rim
Made a highlight film
Threw it down
Hung on the rim
Chinned up and kicked out
Landed with a Shaq-style grimace
Got “T”ed up
Didn’t matter
’Cause she took us up with her
On her broad back
On her lithe legs
On her strong shoulders
Made us PROUD
LOUD and rowdy
In our living rooms
In sports bars
At college and pro games
Made me rise a little higher
To throw his shot into the bleachers
The only sensational play
These 43-year-old knees
Can still parlay
And when we hit the playgrounds,
City parks, school gyms, driveway hoops,
Any court with a cylinder
Poised to accept offerings
Of our hopes and dreams
Of equality, equity
A level playing field
Title IX indeed
Not just in name
And plans and schemes and memories
Of cheers and glory and adulation, and promise
Sheer joy
Of bodies in motion
Of striving, thriving and deriving
The last ounce of energy, determination
Frustration at any limitation
Engendering fearlessness
In other arenas
In which ovaries
Give us competitive advantages
Over cojones!

Yancey is a physician and associate professor in the Department of Community Health Sciences. A former center for Northwestern’s women’s varsity basketball team, she is a poet/spoken word artist. Her CD, “Renaissance Woman/Race Woman,” was released in 2001.