The Tide Runs Against Health Reform

An accomplished poet I definitely am not,
So a poem like this is with danger fraught.

But the tide is running against health care reform,
As defined by the elements of the gathering storm.

First is a growing sense of fiscal irresponsibility,
A fear debt will drown out any future affordability.

Next comes the intrinsic overall complexity,
And its close cousin, incomprehensibility.

Next is anxiety about losing what one has got,
to the hordes of uninsured who have got it not.

Next to the old comes potential shrinking of Medicare piggy bank,
with shifts to others – illegals, the young - fill in the blank.

Next follows mounting deep skepticism that government can be trusted,
to cover all, raise quality, and lower costs without going busted.

Shakespeare said, there is a tide in the affairs of men,
which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune.

There is another kind of tide in the affairs of mankind,
which, taken at its ebb, leads on to receding of the mind.

The Obama tide brought in health reform with a shout,
This time, at least for now, the tide may take it out.