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I Am Third · Backward Mutters Poetry Podcast

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: You are listening to the Backward Mutters Poetry Podcast.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: Please visit online at backwardmutters.substack.com.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: There you can subscribe via your favorite podcast player and read the newsletter.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: I'm your host, Randy Edwards.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: Today's poem was written in response to a prompt given for a Poem a Day Challenge back in 2024.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: The day's prompt was third place.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: Almost reflexively,
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: when I hear the expression third place or even the word third,
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: I cannot help but think of a book I read in my late elementary school years.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: The book,
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: I Am Third,
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  SPEAKER_00: was written by Gail Sayers,
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: the Chicago Bears football running back,
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: and it was the basis for a 1971 made-for-TV movie titled Brian's Song.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: And that movie tells the story of Gail Sayers' friendship with his Bears teammate Brian Piccolo.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: I believe I got my copy of the book in 1974,
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: and it was around that time that I saw the movie for the first time.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: In 1974, I was playing for the Bears just like Gale Sayers and Brian Piccolo.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: Except we were really the Bad News Bears, and we weren't in Chicago.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: I was playing halfback for a football team in the NCAA.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: But not that NCAA, though I was playing football in the state of Ohio.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't Ohio State.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: The NCAA was only the NCAA of the Northern Columbus Athletic Association.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: Now both the book and the movie shaped my imagination in significant ways.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: There was the reality of the nation's ongoing need to address
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: the strained racial relations it faced in the midst of
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: the time's lingering segregation.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: There were themes of deep,
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: meaningful male relationships full of exhortation,
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  SPEAKER_00: challenge,
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: and practical jokes,
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: together with the kind of friendship that is marked by steadfast faithfulness.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, there was the blessing of the kind of friendship forged in the fire of adversity.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: The book and movie both portray a kind of love that continues through illness,
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: death, and lingering grief.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: Brian Piccolo stuck to Gayle Sayers' side when he recovered from his knee surgery,
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: but soon after, he himself succumbed to and died of cancer in June of 1970.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: Gayle Sayers' book is a tribute to their friendship.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: Gayle Sayers himself finally passed away on September 23, 2020.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: Now, it came to my attention recently that a dear friend of mine passed away also
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: on September 23rd, several years later after Gail Sayers died.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: My friend was himself a great fan of the Chicago Bears,
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: and in honor of friendship and in memory of both their passings,
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: I re-offer this poem, which is titled after Sayers' book, I Am Third.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: George Hallis wanted his bears to bloom,
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: so he put Gail and Brian in the same room together,
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: so simple yet not done before that a black man and white share the same door.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: They walked through that door,
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: walked together in life late through the 60s where societal strife tried
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: to tear their bonds of friendship apart, exposed a deep rift in our country's heart.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: Their bond of suffering makes grown men cry.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: One blows his knee, then the other one dies.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: The story found me in 74, and hearing the knock, I opened the door.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: Every true story, they say, ends in death.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: And in that true story I now draw my breath,
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: breathe in the love for friends who lay down their life for a friend,
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: to win love's other crown.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: Love, indeed, like Brian, as Gail in word, where God is first, others second, and I third.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: You've been listening to the Backward Mutters Poetry Podcast.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: I'm your host, Randy Edwards.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening.