Toil, Envy, Want, the Patron and the Gaol

I went to London where the streets are paved with gold,
But "all that glisters is not gold", often have I heard this told,
Now I must work, to get me bread and to stop the cold.

"Fie, fie, faint-hearted Knight," say I, I wish I were a man,
A man like Hercules, big and strong
Or a man like Apollo, never wrong.
I want to be, but I cannot, and alas I have forgot,
I must thank Him for what I am, ha-ha . . . the fat man in the pan?
I want to be, and though I can't, I'll ask until he says I shan't.

I am the patron, but of what? The church is empty of my self,
My prayer book, dusty, new, untouched upon the shelf.
The public bar I won't go in, for there I will find sin;
Or will I? They're all happy inside, happy and gay,
and I'm very thirsty. A beer, gin, whiskey. Hey, I say!
. . . . I've had a tink or two, now I must think anew.

Chris Loft 1968