Saluting Vermont Green FC women: ‘Ode to the women sleeping on the bus’

July 24, 2026

The author's daughter Iris DeVoe (left) and friend Hadley Ward (right) meet Vermont Green player Louisa Thomsen from Waterbury at a playoff game. Photo by Colleen Ovelman

To the Community:

While the World Cup and all its melodramas have been raging on, our family has been cheering on the Vermont Green Women FC team.

A good friend has a daughter on the team, and she told me that they traveled back and forth to every away game this season on the bus, sometimes arriving home at 3 in the morning. 

We have been so inspired by these women – their talent and athleticism, their commitment, their grit. We have also been inspired by the amazing fan base filling the stadium at UVM's Virtue Field, and especially enamored to see a flood of young girls and boys race onto the pitch after every home game for a chance to meet the players.

What an amazing gift this is for young people, especially girls, to see such enthusiasm for a women's sports team. While the Vermont Green Women may not have come away with the national title, they have won so much this season – on and off the pitch – for themselves but especially for the young girls and women of our community.

Because I am a poet and because poetry often captures the weight of such moments better than other forms of writing, I wrote a poem for the Vermont Green Women's team.

Ode to the women sleeping on the bus

for the Vermont Green FC Women

By Colleen Ovelman

because the young girls clad in Vermont green

who rush onto the field after every match would never guess 

(nor care) there's no money for hotels

because their classmates and baby sisters and big brothers 

barrel behind them eager to tumble through the dense humidity

of sweat the women leave behind

because the women also leave on the turf every ounce of their 

fated breath, every beat of their female-sized hearts –

because, after all, female-sized hearts are the better to feel you with

because somewhere, again, the men are being explained

and forgiven for their bad behavior – another father, even the 

president, is calling another coach another principal another 

official to make sure another son doesn't lose

but tonight my daughter takes a Sharpie onto the LED-illuminated

pitch, silver as Eris, goddess of discord and strife

her legs join the chorus of sun-kissed legs running past a banner 

of rainbow bubble letters – Everyone watches women's sports –

to the outer reaches of the solar system

star-struck by galaxies and all the possibilities of galaxies beyond

body covered in a never-seen-before mélange of signatures – 

no World Cup wager or Tooth Fairy 

could deliver a bigger win

Colleen Ovelman

Waterbury Center

Colleen Ovelman is a poet and editor living in Central Vermont, and a parent to quite a few soccer players and fans.