Staples.

and so it had come to late Friday

in a place so different, a world away

from the stage and lights of

universal theatres

where the hands raised

were pale and thin

flying not for a president,

but for the bundles of money floating,

immune from the tall high-rise of the factories

devoid of furnished floors,

a brigade of toys to be sent

to those with TVs

while we dream only of staples

and the roubles no longer

building blocks of civilisation

but of children.

And now, the roulette wheel

Spinning in front of me,

As 15 years later I pray

In the land I had dreamed about

To anyone I remember

From my half-cast school years,

That the pale ball should grasp the goal

The time passed, irrelevant

My mother, in the house

A win again, true America

Bread for a dinner.