Sep 2018
You rush on, you prurient godly men
Striving, struggling, and all for what? -
Riches and fame and their mundane pleasures,
Hoping always that money will bring happiness.
Is that all that this mad life has become? -
A merry-go-round ride to oblivion?
Please stop the world I’d like to get off,
And God and I will watch with saddened eyes
As we wonder why He gave man free choice.
I’m tired of watching people as they seem
Searching blindly for some happiness
And they could find it too. It’s such a shame,
Those blinkers of money hide it from them.
What can I say to them? What can I do?
They’d never hear; they’re too busy figuring,
“If I take a course or two this summer
And a couple more next winter if I can
That would raise me up one category.
Why I’d make nearly three hundred more a year!
Man, oh man, with that kind of salary
A guy could just about be satisfied.”
Just about is right. They’ll never give up
Killing themselves for “just another buck.”
They have no time for God. “And anyway
How could He give us this happiness?”
I’d tell them, “by assuring more than this
Vain struggle which ends only at the grave.”
But already, again they interrupt.
“Love can’t bring you joy either, by itself.
You’ve gotta have money first; that the thing.
Once you’ve got it you don’t need to worry.”
I’d ask them why happiness can’t just be
Doing what you want to do, the best you can
And having enough money to get by,
With a wife and couple of kids to love.
And church on Sunday and God throughout the week,
Knowing always that you’re going “somewhere.”
But they’re not listening to me again.
They look instead for penny that fell.
So, I’ll go and let them live their lives, their way.
- D. H. Lester - age 19 (1965)
Striving, struggling, and all for what? -
Riches and fame and their mundane pleasures,
Hoping always that money will bring happiness.
Is that all that this mad life has become? -
A merry-go-round ride to oblivion?
Please stop the world I’d like to get off,
And God and I will watch with saddened eyes
As we wonder why He gave man free choice.
I’m tired of watching people as they seem
Searching blindly for some happiness
And they could find it too. It’s such a shame,
Those blinkers of money hide it from them.
What can I say to them? What can I do?
They’d never hear; they’re too busy figuring,
“If I take a course or two this summer
And a couple more next winter if I can
That would raise me up one category.
Why I’d make nearly three hundred more a year!
Man, oh man, with that kind of salary
A guy could just about be satisfied.”
Just about is right. They’ll never give up
Killing themselves for “just another buck.”
They have no time for God. “And anyway
How could He give us this happiness?”
I’d tell them, “by assuring more than this
Vain struggle which ends only at the grave.”
But already, again they interrupt.
“Love can’t bring you joy either, by itself.
You’ve gotta have money first; that the thing.
Once you’ve got it you don’t need to worry.”
I’d ask them why happiness can’t just be
Doing what you want to do, the best you can
And having enough money to get by,
With a wife and couple of kids to love.
And church on Sunday and God throughout the week,
Knowing always that you’re going “somewhere.”
But they’re not listening to me again.
They look instead for penny that fell.
So, I’ll go and let them live their lives, their way.
- D. H. Lester - age 19 (1965)
I wrote this in 1965 as a 19-year-old and then spent the next 20 years chasing the many of the things my youthful self admired and critiqued. Now fifty years later that what appears to be ambition or greed is often a futile attempt to prove we are '"good enough" and to win approval.
I got the wife and a couple of kids and I did do church on Sunday, but as my first marriage crumbled I came to realize that real satisfaction is an inside job. Now I know that "doing what you want to do, the best you can" comes without expectations and may lead to some very unexpected places.
I got the wife and a couple of kids and I did do church on Sunday, but as my first marriage crumbled I came to realize that real satisfaction is an inside job. Now I know that "doing what you want to do, the best you can" comes without expectations and may lead to some very unexpected places.
