Temenos

The game is sacred, and sacred
Are the games. Etymology
Is a twisty, slithering guide

To any arguments, a snake
Mistaken for a plumb line, but
Its shadows show how people think.

Tmesis. A cutting. Cutting
Off, temnein. The early Greeks
Practicing their demarcations

And set asides, called the estates
Allotted to prominent men
By the same name as sacred lands

Reserved for gods, sanctuaries,
Temenos. Drawing boundaries,
Whatever the term, outlining

Arbitrary designations
To create pockets ruled by rules,
Social arrangements, agreements,

The cutting and the creating
Of rules applicable inside
A set-aside hole in the world,

This is the essence of the game.
Here, etymology latches
Right on the vein. The creation

Of areas as if apart
From the hurly burly of things
That fall as they happen to fall,

Places where rules of property
Or divinity, ritual,
Set, appropriate behaviors,

Whether groves or wells or ball fields
Or temples or courts or estates
Or amphitheaters or boards

Small enough to drop in pocket
On which tiny tokens are moved,
These are all the makings of games,

The playful, the dead serious,
And within them, within their bounds,
The rules, however trivial,

Enforced only by consensus
Of the people enforcing them,
Irrelevant beyond their bounds,

Obtain as if truly sacred.
And they are. The sacred itself
Is purely feature of the game.