Leave Me No Vanities
By John Herlihy

I tell myself life is bigger than me,
Just look round at everything we see.
A fiery sun simply rises from the East,
Phases of the moon a moveable feast.
Thunder rumbles in beats of my heart,
Lightning can split an ancient tree apart.
Why am I caught in the trap of my ego,
Wandering thru life as if caught in limbo?

What we hate in others we love in ourselves;
We are blindsided about what our vanity tells.
Flattery cheap coin where our vanities thrive,
Giving to us added riches our vanity to survive.
Our vanities and passions need to be expunged,
Bad habits and foibles in which we have lunged.
Why, even a display of modesty can make us vain,
Pride a suitable companion our vanity to sustain.

Let me surrender my ego up as a petty illusion,
All those feeble desires still awash in profusion.
Let me accept my suffering as truly a thing noble,
Whatever sorrows come are there just to ennoble.
Vanities cloud the soul and finally turn it to rust,
My petty ego banished forever as I know I must.
Leave me no stubborn vanities I must still forsake,
Without those vanities, I hope my life to remake.