next to of course god america i

The poem "next to of course god america i" by e.e. cummings makes absolutely no sense to me. However, there are some things I noticed about this poem that could help me to deconstruct it. First of all, the majority of the poem is in quotation marks. This sort of gives off the idea that this is a quote of some sort. Next, I noticed that two patriotic songs are partially quoted, the Star Spangled Banner and America the Beautiful. I believe that these help the author to add a unique "American" effect to the poem. Finally, this poem gave off the idea that the speaker could be a preacher. The quotation marks and the drink of water at the end tell me that the speaker was most likely speaking to a certain group of people about America.