Independence Day Celebration

There will be two postings today, the first is the below poem that I wrote two years ago, the other will be an article celbrating Independence Day.

The Higher Praise to…

There is no better sight in this life
Then seeing a man standing tall
Free from the shackles of strife
Nothing will ever make him fall
For he follows his own mind
In making the decisions for life
Never will he be in a tight bind
Following this ultimate rule of life

There is no better sight in this life
Then seeing a man accomplish a task alone
Cutting his way through the world like a knife
For he will never allow anyone to own
The tool upon which he lives and survives
It is his to use and conquer what he sees
Not squandering his life or other lives
For his life is measured in great deeds

There is no better sight in this life
Then seeing a man earning what he owns
He counts his success not in saving life
But in the irony of life’s ups and downs
For it is the fighting and struggling for it
That makes living all the sweeter
The hot sweating and grisly bleeding of it
Which allows him to come out the better


There is no better sight in this life
Then seeing a man on high peering over
For he is seeing the future, the future of all life
For in the infinite distance of forever
It isn’t into the dark abyss of night
Nor the hell bound train the world is riding
But the hidden and the forbidden hope of light
For the future rewards those who do the creating


For there is no better sight in this life
Then seeing a man of independence
Living by his own rule’s in this life
Never giving over to the credence
Of the morality of self sacrificing
Never living for the life of the other
But just enjoying the simplicity of living
This is why I give no praise the higher
Then to the Independent Man living

Keith Engel ©
Monday, August 30, 2004