mammon


success


to be a success
you've gotta make your bones
it ain't larger or smaller
than what you own

if you made money
you made success
the two are conflated
over them we obsess

the purpose of wealth
is to ascend
to upper caste
and make dividends

but this is a treadmill
you cannot outrun
and after a million
you'll want a million and one

no one can protect
a house full of gold
when you heap up a pile
you're bound by its hold

and if you succeed in your amassing
others start to look like widgets
what were once human people
become means to raise your digits

when people become simple means
to operate on your worth
whether they feel or suffer
makes no difference to your mirth

and so success is what we make
money or human care
if you uphold the god mammon
then for yourself beware