ABOVE WEST 84TH

Here I sit above the street,
Watching cars and people pass,
Quite above the trials they meet
In the midst of life’s morass.

Some seem hurried as they move
Along West eighty-fourth;
Others seem more in the groove
With what life now brings forth.

I wonder why some look so sad,
As if life dealt a losing hand,
And others smile and look so glad
One would think they owned the land?

Some seem to have the look of pain
As worry shapes their wrinkled brow,
And others seem to walk on gain;
All their life a “Golden Cow”!

Is life unfair in what she gives;
Does she let favorite people win?
Or does luck hinge on how man lives,
Or simply what he’s involved in?

Happiness, divined by choice,
Is attitude we strive to build
Until it is an inner voice
Pronouncing peace that we have willed?