At nine years old, I won the spelling bee,
And it has all been downhill ever since.
You’d never know it now from reading me,
So error-filled, the editors all wince
At those few language skills that I evince.
So if I could, I might go back in time
And stay a spell, instead of work in rhyme.
But no: I now recall I was abjured
For winning weeks on end without a pause.
The first time I misspelled some stupid word
My fourth grade class burst into wild applause
For I was widely hated – with some cause.
I learned my lesson, though, and learned it well:
And ne’er again in school did I excel.
For athletes and musicians, it’s all fine
To be, or strive to be, the very best:
To push your way up to the front of line
And stand out from the mass, the crowd, the rest –
Just do not do it on an IQ test.
For as they say in Tokyo, I’ve found
The nail that lifts its head gets hammered down
That’s upsetting 🙁 but it’s a lesson I learned too – not that I ever won a spelling bee
So many of us do. Sad, really.
True, and, Ugh — I have felt your temporary defeat (which likely made you an even more dedicated, readable, memorable poet now).
I deliberately misspelled every word in every school spelling bee from then on…
Wow, I guess you showed THEM! Awww.. life leaves its little scars in every stage, doesn’t it? They’re like little tatts on the inside, that someone else designed. Fortunately, they sooner-or-later coalesce and form into an arrow as if to say, —>Go.. do your own (other) thing, now! Or so I’d like to think. 🙂
awesome.