"American Football"

That I would even use the phrase suggests A false yet useful worldliness, a scope Far greater than my caste would indicate. The phrase signals, “I’ve lived abroad! I’ve watched The Premier League in European pubs!” In fact I hate the game; its ethos rests On boring strategies and rules that cope, Merely, with competition’s link to fate, How luck and skill dovetail in every botched Clear kick on goal, and every header rubs Against the grain of what is beautiful In sport, at least to my Yankee Doodle eyes. Give me smashmouth football over soccer. Give me concussions, shattered bones, ripped muscles, Strategies of season-long attrition. Give me huge men heaving their bountiful Frames against each other with such grace that size Seems incidental to the role of stalker Of fleet backs and fleeter ends, men who bustle Along the line of scrimmage on a mission. A hundred and sixty-pound defensive end, I was the scourge of JV quarterbacks. I blitzed on every down, so spent the game With most the action at my back; the coach Didn’t seem to care; he was drunk on power And vodka, said my job was to defend Right flank from sweeps and register some sacks. Helter skelter, I dreamed of gridiron fame. Much less than mediocre, I could not broach The fact of pain, the realm where bruises flower.