day ONE HUNDRED and FIFTY

Hymn to the Greatest

I pulled into the goodwill

the one near the college

the one near the wal-mart

the one across the highway from a convenience store

the one down the highway from two more convenience stores

the one overlooking the nuclear power plant

the one right where the incline to the highlands starts

the car cd player is broken

scan the dial on the radio

I rest on the right wing nut

                the guy filling in for Savage

                the guy whose anti Muslim rhetoric is nauseating

                the guy that says America is the greatest country in the world

I wonder momentarily about the greatest country in the world

was there a vote, a quorum, did a group of countries

get together and sing He’s a Jolly Good Fellow

then give us a wrist watch for our service

talk about how they want to be great countries too

we should probably be suspicious

of anyone American who says

this is the greatest country

it isn’t, I don’t know off my head

that I would hand that award out to any country

a country is as good as the people it contains

it is a reflection of the attitudes of those people

it is also wholly imaginary and man made

like time, like god, like boundaries, like dreams

to ballyhoo is propaganda

it obfuscates the real conversation

the fact that to question, to challenge

the normalcy of any government

is patriotism, its required

for any country to be the

proper reflection of its people

to say you’re the greatest

without proof, without basis

is to be a child

god forbid

we are a nation

of children

--Jason Baldinger