by Vincent F. A. Golphin
It’s America, half time,
split between two determined tribes
vie for the hearts and minds of the crowd,
in a widely watched game
half-time America
phrase born in a bid for profit
praise for a dream gone wild
seized by prophesy
best described in dreary terms
a fight, struggle, challenge
between the US we’ve seen
and the US that’s yet to be
half-time America
crowds shudder in the pull
towards the desires that haunt
dreams - prosperity and peace -
and a past where the few
possessed the Dream in comfort
anxious from the first half
America in half time wonders
at what can happen next
hopes the next round
has quarterbacks who lead
not team players who
fumble and falter through plans
maybe there is no such thing as
someone who can lead US
down time’s rich green carpet
as individuals merge into a body,
team, for an advance into the unseen
inch by yard, year by year
players fall and sacrifice
to push toward victory
the prize that bends all efforts
out of the morass
of despair, greed and violence
down the way toward
the end that seems so far,
yet looms beyond reach,
every game’s goal, an end
America pushes
into the second half
faces the fate of inevitable choices
renewal or repeat.
Vincent F. A. Golphin writes and lives in Western, New York. His latest work is 10 Stories Down (FootHills Press), poems inspired by two, six-month stays in China. His poetry, fiction and essays have also appeared in Yellow Medicine Review, Washington Living, Upstate New Yorker, The Southern Quarterly, Reporter Magazine, Drylongso, Fyah, MentalSatin, Pinnacle Hill Review, Invisible Universe, Bridges, Ishmael Reed's Konch Magazine, New Verse News, and UpandComing Magazine.
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