"The "Non-Blues""

Dharmadas's recent "One-Minute Challenge" video (Eliminate Complaining!) touched on a few lines from "The Non-Blues" written by Swami Kriyananda. In this video, Dharmadas shares the song, and some thoughts about the points Swamiji makes in the lyrics, as well as the charming story that led to him writing the song in the first place. Lyrics below:

The Non-Blues (by Swami Kriyananda)

1. (spoken) What’m Ah doin’, hangin’ out in this cellar? It’s like this: Ah’m composin/a blue. No, it ain’t the blues, ‘cause it’s only one, An’brother, one’s all Ah can do.

2. Ah’m hangin’ mah head like Ah oughta,

Mah chair is a case of gin,

An’ mah mouth Ah have drooped like a Saint Bernard

Till its corners are touchin’ mah chin.

3. You may ask, “Why you feelin’ so blue?”

Well, Ah ain’t; Ah just thought Ah should try,

‘Cause some feller said, “All those songs of yours

Ain’t fer real: they don’t make no one cry.”

4. So Ah thought, Let’s just find me some cellar,

For the only way to feel blue

Is forget the sun, an’ pretend the world

Is as dark as a fireplace flue.

5. (Spoken) Oh, that’s realism, yeah! Love that gutter! Yet – Ah wonder if we ain’t been misled. How much reality can a man see, anyway When he sits all day, hangin’ his head?

6. Now it ain’t that Ah don’t know what grief is;

This ole heart has had its full share.

But grief’s one thing, and’ complainin’ another:

Why multiply grief with despair?

7. For Ah find that this whole world around me,

Like a mirror upon the wall,

Smiles back when Ah smile, looks blue when Ah’m blue –

An’ that blue shade Ah don’t like at all!

8. Well, Ah’m goin’ back to mah bad ole haunts.

Mah time here is almost done. The fact is, feller,

Ah can’t stand this cellar,

Ah just gotta get out in the sun!