The American Experiment

Photograph by Dianne Woods

The American 

Experiment 

is not dead

regardless 

of your despair

or what they tell you.

The American 

Experiment

is not broken

but doing exactly what 

we should expect it to do 

if left attended 

by a select group 

and not the collective 

for whom it should speak. 

The American 

Experiment 

has delivered

painful lessons of neglect 

and made public the shame 

of our complacency. 

The American 

Experiment 

has survived 

great afflictions that have

given us a vision of the perfect 

because we have experienced our imperfections 

and lessons in healing 

because we have suffered 

and caused great suffering.

The American 

Experiment 

grants no immunity 

to the righteously indignant

who deny their guilt

and cast blame upon their neighbors.

The American 

Experiment 

sings 

the song of the Body Politic 

written with the sound of voices

complicit in their silence.

The American 

Experiment 

pauses at all crossroads

as we determine 

if these are the times that were

or the times that shall be.

Ken Owen    Van Niddy Press   December 2016