The Writers' Circle

HAPPINESS                                        
				by
                                       Scott Ballantyne.

Is it in the depths of depression
that happiness is so shallow?
Or is it the mellow thinker
who knows of its short life?
Or is it the living day
where happiness is a feeling higher
with its limits just below?

Is it only true romantics
who find its lasting joy?
Or do even they, through time,
taste its souring, tainted cloy?

If to be content is happy
only there can the constant be.
But to have constant content
what an uneventful life
we would see.
Cattle are content.

In love there is happiness
but it must be shared
with fear, pride and pain
and the heart be bared
to cruel Fate's domain.

There is a happiness in living
but no depth to its young time.
Is it in the depths of depression
that it is so shallow,
or is it the mellow thinker who will know
of its short way?
Or is it the living day
where happiness is a feeling higher, say,
with its limits just below?

On these short spells of happiness
we base our life's dreams.
The high pitch of those moments
balance all else, it seems.
Yet to bypass one man
and favour his brother,
we are forced to accept
for there is no other.