First, if you've not heard it before, you must listen to Meg Christian's unforgettable song from the summer of 1983, "Look Within." You Tube has it, and with charming images, as well.
The Washington Post printed the lyrics; it was that much of a local hit. I saved the clipping for years.
At the time I was doing some thinking about the difference between agnostic existentialism and Christian existentialism (see the book review post). My one and only attempt to live with an extrovert had ended, without bloodshed but not without deep emotional wounds, so I completely "got" No Exit, but I didn't think my self was all that much better than other people's selves. The advantage of being an introvert was clear, but I thought it went only so far.
So durng the week after I started learning "Look Wihtin," I wrote a Reprise. I changed the tune--I wasn't afraid of sounding traditional. At the time changing the tune seemed to emphasize the idea that MC's "Look Within" was a good song, and my Reprise was my song.
Y'know...you can disagree with a writer's opinion, and still allow that person wrote a good song. That's one of the things the young don't seem to have had time to learn, while they were memorizing all tat p.c. malarleu abpit the existence of non-Black people being racist, except for Black people of talent and achievement, who get to be sort of honorary racists too, somehow. Understanding how Martin Luther King was racist obviously uses up a tremendous amount of memory and the young have not lived long enough to grow much more memory than that, so...Anyway, what a far-out concept: you can listen to, and like, words that are not yours, words with which you disagree. Those words can actually help you find the words that express your own ideas! Can you dig it?
Look within, and what do you
find?
Litter on the bottom of your
mind;
Shadows of bright lights, and
records of wrongs,
Lyrics to last year’s top
ten songs,
One good stone in ten barrels
of bricks,
Ten—or was it six—sixty-six,
Mess of emotions, tangled and
seething,
And the roaring storm wind of
your own breathing.
Look around, and what do you
find?
So-called friends who leave
you behind,
Sewage piped into ocean
waters,
Parents abused by sons and
daughters,
Money gained from lives
destroyed,
The whole worldview of Sigmund
Freud,
Sick babies spitting, wailing
and teething,
And the hot stench of other
people’s breathing.
Look above if you want to find
Knowledge to occupy your mind,
Freedom with something left to
lose
To point you right and let you
choose,
Love that warms but sets no
fires,
Peace that comforts but never
tires,
A gift beyond all that mortals
could give,
To improve the lives we live.
For only with Law is there any
liberty;
Only in Heaven is truth’s
totality;
Only in constancy is love’s
variety;
Look above, if you look for
reality.
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