Freedom is victory, not money and power: A poem

How do we fall for little short-lived victories 

In such pursuits, it is our souls that are diseased 

That we resolutely seek to emulate those that win 

Our icons are those that are in power and wealth, and live in sin 

What we aspire for is an edifice of just a lifetime 

And in such seeking we do our fates an indelible crime 

We seem to think that life is all about what we gain 

This sunshine is an illusion, when in fact it is rain 

Close on the heels of desire comes hopeless despair 

when our expectations are belied; as we choose not to dare 

material failure, yet not knowing that selflessness is our fare 

to greater windfall, rather than the fantasies that we bear 

Victory is not in temporal successes, which are but a snare 

Money and power are meaningless, if we do not care 

to heed to conscience. For we must be committed to attain 

our liberation from the whorl of damning eternal pain