Higher
i so desperately want to see the artist
the poet
the lover
but I cannot
i see the jock
the bound up wound up athlete
the muscle
at times the myth of the amazon
i see the savage
primed and ready for the sport
and it is more than just physicality
intensity and necessity to move
think on the feet and fly
it’s the quick trigger
and the brute force
the capacity
desire
to overwhelm
control
beyond even the propensity to violence
sanctioned or otherwise
the rage the jealousy the hate
othering
it’s the quickness to the line
and the lifeless eye capacity to cross it it’s the
prejudice
predation
power
the irrationality and the sheer passion for the psychopathic play in it all
i see the end in itself
i see the end justify all means
and in that end I see me
…..
i stare
so f**king desperate
and i see the beauty
the beautiful bodies
the ideal form
the ideal function
perfection
gods
and the goddess replace the amazon
i see the transcendence of bodily powers
and that of the mind
a mysterious excellence
i see and sense calm amongst
and wisdom hover above
chaos
and it is here I find the real
the raw
simplicity
silence
spaces in between
secret pauses in the action and knowledge in and of the nothingness
i find respect
humility
patience and compassion
i find empathy
an acknowledgement of a shared vulnerability
our frailty
our fragility
our pain
desperation
a roaring insatiable untranslatable ache
striving
for survival
to reach
and reach out
i see the high touch helping hand up and the all encompassing hug void of all self-consciousness
and paradoxically amongst the hulking heroics i see and sense and believe in belonging
equality
and in these moments grace
it is here that i find heart
something valuable to be gained
all that cannot be taught
…..
i see the mirror now
and it’s jagged bipolar crack
on one side the ritualised combat
gratuitous logic
blood spilled
along arbitrary lines
on the other the aesthetic
the art
magico-religous phenomenal poetry in motion
the ball an astral body
a planet tossed around by gods
i see meaning
a worthwhile use of time
i see your reflection too
and mine
the world
i see the divine
in this war without guns.
…..
For
Sports Management Students. Second Lecture Trimester 1, 2023.
Location | Date
Griffith University, Online| Teams + Recording
15 | 03 | 2023
Image
‘ampersand rams duelling’
297mm x 210mm | A4 | Landscape
Ink on Translucent Paper
29 | 11 | 2023
Publication Date (Self Published)
30 | 11 | 2023
Text Notes
Louis Arnaud Reid ⎮ Aesthetics and Education (1974).
David N. Aspin ⎮ Sport And The Concept Of The Aesthetic (1974).
Gary Gagliardi ⎮ Sun Tzu’s The Art Of War
Alun Hardman ⎮ Evaluating Changing Sport Technology: An Ethnocentric Approach (2008).
Hans Keller ⎮ Sport And Art – The Concept Of Mastery (1974).
Sigmund Loland ⎮ Sport Technologies – A Moral View (2008).
George Orwell ⎮ War minus the shooting (1945).
Clarissa Sebag-Montefiore ⎮ A form of tribalism (2018).
Pat Smith ⎮ Introduction – John Groth’s World Of Sport (1970).
Lao Tzu ⎮ Tao Te Ching (1868).
David Foster Wallace ⎮ The mystery and metaphysics of Federer (2018).
Alan Watts ⎮ The Way Of Zen (1957)