"Competition"

In honor of National Poetry Month, I have shared work by myself each Friday. I leave you with a new poem, "Competition." It was David Sarnoff who said "Competition brings out the best in products and the worst in people."

Competition

I don’t want to go back to
all the times I was blind,
to disappear like a ghost,
to be exhausted but
pretty on the inside,
to taste the world
in a sweet poison.
What if one day
it plays on repeat,
over and over,
what if the answer is now
and they never heard the question,
the one about what time it is,
always the same time,
because they never heard the question.
I imagine walking away from it all.
Will I miss it tomorrow?
Next year?
Ten years?
I’m not interested in
competing with anyone.
I never was.

©JEF 2022

Another Sunday

"Sports plays a societal role in engendering jingoist and chauvinist attitudes. They're designed to organize a community to be committed to their gladiators."
--Noam Chomsky

"The addiction to sports, therefore, in a peculiar degree marks an arrested development in man's moral nature."
--Thorstein Veblen

"A few sports foster a culture of violence. Such a misguided culture too often spills over into barbaric acts in and out of competition...
The 'trample the opponent' philosophy espoused by some coaches and parents sends the wrong message about the core value of empathy."
--Dan Doyle

"Competition brings out the best in products and the worst in people."
--David Sarnoff

Competition and Violence and War

"Competition brings out the best in products and the worst in people."
--David Sarnoff

"The pinnacle of human consciousness must be the rejection of unhealthy competition, war, and violence."
--Bryant H. McGill

Competition

“Competition brings out the best in products and the worst in men.”
--David Sarnoff, father of TV broadcasting