Golf Secrets not Intel

For the past four weeks I have posted four line poems. I plan to continue. However, since “secrets” are in the news, I thought I would interrupt the four line poems in favor of a poem that I wrote recently called “Golf Secrets.” 

GOLF SECRETS

Google “golf secrets” and what do you get?
Over 30 million sites to explore
All these “secrets” which are anything but
Guaranteed to lower your score!

Putting secrets, more than a few
Secrets that help with your short game as well
But why are all the experts who know them
So ready, willing  and eager to tell?

Full swing secrets are most numerous
And come in endless variety
Some intended to let you hit straighter
Others claiming to reduce anxiety. 

 The pros, I suppose, all believe in secrets
Untold thoughts that let them excel
Hogan kept his quiet the longest
Until semiretired he would not tell.

He finally did reveal his secret
In ’55 as Herb Wind reported
Not sure how many have understood
The details being descriptively contorted.

It may be that “secrets” is really a code word
A way of dressing up all those golf tips
Like calling a common seafood concoction
Something more esoteric than fish and chips.

But the problem is with all the secrets
That drowned us golfers from Jan to December
When out on a course and in need of help
We know there’s one, but just can’t remember.

Leon S White, PhD

(The “Herb Wind” referred to in the 5th stanza is Herbert Warren Wind, one of the top three golf writers of the 20th century. He wrote mostly for the New Yorker Magazine, but shifted to Sports Illustrated from 1954 -1960. Wind wrote at least one golf poem. Search under his name to find it and more information about Wind.)