Ruins of Vanity

And here I stand
In conscious stupor
Amidst
Discarded humanity
One among them
With their minds askance
Pining for dreams
Denying reality

I chanced on him
On whom the Gods had
Lavished their affection
He had drunk
In copious, hungry gulps
Off Venus, sans reflection

And when Cupid did string
His little bow
They came in pile
Row after row
Wine, wench
And the choicest venison
They bade him forget
His approaching pension

Now, his wife was
Excess baggage, he was loath
To take in tow
Yes. His wife
And their children too
They simply had to go

More wine and wench
And rare venison
He cared a fig
For his Pelagian pension

Then… the Gods,
They spat on his face
Indeed they did
And how!
He realised then
It was only the sands
And not the fields
That he did plough

Him, whom the Gods had,
Loved to a fault
Him, they now left
Without bread or salt
Him, on whom they had,
Lavished affection
Him, they condemned to
Eternal damnation

Between laughter and tears
He recalls his days
When cold of reason
He had gone about his ways

He had scoffed to the ground
The necessity of choice
He had turned a deaf ear
To his chiding inner voice

Set to a definite
Rhythm, the wheels
Of fortune turn
Good for good
Or bad for bad
As our deeds we earn

And so it was
With him as well
He’d paved his way to
His own private hell

He repents today
His brief spell of sin
He knows for his lifetime
He’d have to stay in

He now finds comfort
In mutual sorrow
And dreams, like the rest
Of a benign tomorrow

Would that his wait
Weren’t just a dream
He’d sealed his fate
Long ago, it does seem

Turning back in stupor
I cling on to my sanity
And walk away in haste
From this ruin of human vanity