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Zvi A. Sesling is Poet Laureate of Brookline, MA. His poetry is in print and online journals in U.S., India, Ireland, France, U.K., N.Z., Ireland, Canada, Australia and Israel. He publishes and edits Muddy River Poetry Review. He reviews for Boston Small Press and Poetry Scene. Sesling’s poetry books include The Lynching of Leo Frank, Fire Tongue and King of the Jungle. Chapbooks include Across Stones of Bad Dreams and Love Poems From Hell. His latest volume of poetry is War Zones, due out from Nixes Mate Books in August. He edited Bagel Bard Anthologies #7, #8 and #12. He lives in Brookline, MA with his wife Susan J. Dechter.

What Life Is Really All About

Zvi A. Sesling

I have tried to make tennis as simple as possible.
You try to hit the ball over the net one more tim
than your opponent does.
– Bjorn Bjorg

Isn’t that what life is really all about

Take war, the idea is to put the bullet
in the enemy or drop bombs on a city
before they do it to you

Then there is business where the seller
tries to separate consumers from their money
and it is all about profit, the people be damned

There is racing where one crosses the finish
line before everyone else by foot, car, on a
horse, whatever

Everyone needs to learn the lesson that to be
a winner they must finish one ahead of everyone
else, one better or they are losers

— Zvi A. Sesling

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