[ Who told you: ]

Who told you:

“You can’t be happy
with what you’ve received”
because they felt
that you should not be?

By what they saw
in your life
through values gained
and morals lost

they perceived:
“You should be unhappy.”

And you believed?

But you smiled
when occupied with basic necessities…

Playing with your children
in the grass… Chasing butterflies,
sliding on wet plastic with them a blast…

Until they arrived to relieve you
of your box

in which you and your kids played
with imagination, abandonment, and wonder

pondered,

since enabled
it
to be twisted

into any which way
it gave you pleasure–

a sense of future possibilities
you did conceive

while visualizing benevolent dreams

through boxes

that streamed you
into timeless fantasy?}

Yet,
they showed you
the game
from which your box came
and went on to proclaim:

“Greater happiness
you’d gain!”

if you too were able
it
to obtain.

So you followed them into their ‘house’
after you left your ‘home’. And your eyes

were opened like Eve’s

while they left you briefly alone to wander about.
Yes, roam in revered silence.

Quite the opposite of noisy companionable laughter
in the atmosphere of which you’d accustomed grown.

Now you’re shown pristine rooms with exquisite treasures.
A life of ease in a land of leisure.

Then returns your host.
Within his hand wine and pills

while his lips boast:
“Let’s toast to happiness!”

As if you were no longer
able to decide for yourself

what’s your pleasure.

Yet, within his eyes you see a ghost.
An emptiness.

And what bewilders you the most–

Why they tied to pry away from you
happiness,

as if you’d be deceived

when they came into
your yard

a sense of basic wonderment
and contentment

to enviously retrieve.

THE WAY OF HAPPINESS
Contentment and Generosity

ITH & SB