"No October" is a poem I wrote in the final month of the anguish-ridden 2013 season of the San Francisco Giants. The season after they won their second World Series in three years. Why did I write a poem about the 2013 Giants and not the 2012 Giants? Frankly they are actually the same team and I guess I have always been more interested in how people react in adversity than in triumph. And the 2013 Giants experienced much in the way of adversity. From injuries to unexpected underperformance and moments of unexpected joy the 2013 Giants never lost that feeling of love and family that had made them so wonderfully successful in 2012. Uniquely, they truly still seemed to love playing together even though so much had gone wrong during the season. They never stopped trying to be good though their titanic efforts met with little success. In September 2013 I just started writing. I think I needed to exorcise much of the angst the season had engendered in me and "No October" was the result. I hope you enjoy It was written with love. Added is a piece of unfinished writing about how baseball has shaped my life.