BALLADE OF SCHOPENHAUER’S PHILOSOPHY

[carose59]

Wishful to add to my mental power,
Avid of knowledge and wisdom, I
Pondered the Essays of Schopenhauer,
Taking his terrible hills on high.
Worried I was, and a trifle shy,
Fearful I’d find him a big opaque!
Thus does he say, with a soul-sick sigh:
“The best you can get is an even break.”

Life, he says, is awry and sour;
Life, he adds, is sour and awry;
Love, he says, is a withered flower;
Love, he adds, is a dragon-fly;
Love, he swears, is the Major Lie;
Life, he vows is the Great Mistake;
No one can beat it, and few can tie.
The best you can get is an even break.

Women, he says, are clouds that lower;
Women dissemble and falsify.
(Those are things that The Conning Tower
Cannot asseverate or deny.)
Futile to struggle, and strain, and try;
Pleasure is freedom from pain and ache;
The greatest thing you can do is die—
The best you can get is an even break.

L’ENVOI

Gosh, I feel like a real good cry!
Life, he says, is a cheat, a fake.
Well, I agree with the grouchy guy—
The best you can get is an even break.


--F. P. A.