Chunkey Poem by Paul Muldoon

A game about which we've got next to nothing straight,
it seems to have been a mash-up of buzkashi and road bowls.
As I try to anticipate a spear-thrower trying to anticipate
the spot where the chunkey-stone rolls

to a standstill, I hear a ten thousand strong shout
go up over the abandoned chunkey-yard at Cahokia, in support,
maybe, of the idea Cahokia will win out.
Maybe we should accept our understanding must fall short

as a spear falls short of this sandstone disk
some take to represent the sun.
Maybe we should accept our grand ambitions as grandiose

and our aversion to averting risk
merely rash. Maybe we should support the idea that having won
will mean merely 'to have come close.'