Wednesday is mid-week. Sometimes it happens in the middle, one is able to with a backward look, take measure of where one has come. Are we in the middle? In the middle of what?

I was urged yesterday to abstain from glancing at my iphone news feed. None of those snippets was positive, “good news.” Mass firings, resignations, and the betrayal of an entire European nation in exchange for the promise of gain, future profits to be made. Are we in the middle or is this just the beginning?

This poem came my way and I think it is worth passing on. Anyone with some background in any of the variants Christianity will register immediately the meaning of the term “Lord.” It is an honorific term indicating the creator and ruler of the cosmos. The identical concept in Italian, capo di tutti capi, the “boss of bosses.”

Here the poet states boldly, baldly, “God’s goodness licks bowls bone-clean.” That’s not what you’d take away from any of the churches after a worship service! The poet riffs upon “the God n’ country” theme so dear to a conservative’s heart. What would America rather pay for, – bombs or food for the hungry? Well, just look at the Pentagon’s budget!

I will not go on. Just read the poem, read mindfully for yourself.

Oh, one more comment. A “two gendered world”, a binary world, just two choices, one good and one evil… If that’s the game that’s played, – which role do you think those with good fortune, with power will take? And everyone else? Indeed, some will rise as guerrillas.

The Lord is American

by W. J. Lofton

The world undresses     
its wounds. It wounds. This Father—     
His memory, torn     
clouds: forgetful weather.     
God’s goodness licks     
bowls bone-clean. Our fingers     
twist crumbs from air.     
We are hungry children     
abandoned by our country     
for bombs. For Rockets’ Red glare. How     
could we ever be patriots?     
My father is my flag.     
The national anthem is     
every word, every single word     
my mother could not whisper—     
could not say,     
could not say:     
her father colonized her.     
Made her mother nasty with jealousy.     
Could not say: she can’t stay     
In this world of touching.     
It maims.     
It elects evil.     
It is two gendered.     
It kneels on Sunday.     
The Lord is     
American &     
aims His rifle     
at us, His children     
once beggars     
rise into guerrillas.

Copyright © 2025 by W. J. Lofton. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on February 17, 2025, by the Academy of American Poets.

“I rarely felt safe as a child. The closest I’ve felt to safety was hanging with my cousins or being by my older sisters’ side[s]. Even then, I felt danger huffing about, stalking me. As a child whose parents suffered premature deaths due to America’s inadequate healthcare and mental health systems, I’m often thinking about children and how they are wrestled down by adult failures. The world’s cruelty shows itself to children through adults, even before they learn words like war, ceasefire, and later, genocide. I believe we owe children a world that loves them, and we must struggle for it at any cost.”
—W. J. Lofton

W. J. Lofton, born in Chicago and raised in Valley, Alabama, is a Black and queer Southern poet. He is the author of boy maybe (Beacon Press, 2025). A recipient of fellowships from Cave Canem and Emory University Arts and Social Justice Program, Lofton lives in Atlanta.

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