Torpedo of the arm
Why do people worship you?
How does a rubber watermelon
Stitched inside thick dead skin
Build total devotion?
I am channels in cool metal
Pushed and pulled electrons
I fail again to comprehend
Your miraculous shape
Symbolic yet compelling force
The most important human games
Mimic the hunt and battle
Teams like armies
War by other means
But games can injure
Yours a paean to pain
Cracked heads
Smashed joints
And that hunk of jello in your head
When struck –
Tsunami in a barrel
Your electricity fails
Identity degrades
It takes years, and
Time is what you had
For a mind like mine
Without arms, legs, joints
I feel sadness for
So much lost
But I cannot deny victory
Running through thunder
Leaping the chasm
Your javelin rises, fires
Flies across past and future
The earth echoes and rumbles
Like the buffalos you chased
Your species’ history
Now gridded inside a hundred yards
For a moment you are gods
Your owners show pride
Triumph is theirs
But you will be remembered
A tiny bullet in time’s arrow
Guided missile of sport
Winning a craving like no other
From your world now lost