Chapter ELEVEN: Old Age

146.
Laugh ye, rejoice ye, when this world is burning?
O wrapped in darkness, will ye not seek light?

147.
Behold this body decked, a mass of sores,
Sickly and swayed by multitudinous thoughts.
Impermanent, unstable, uncomposed!

148.
Poor worn-out carcase, home of sicknesses,
Fragile, corrupting mass, mere life in death!

149.
What joy to look upon these bleached bones,
Like useless gourds in autumn thrown aside!--

150.
A township built of bones and plastered o'er
With flesh and blood, the home and dwelling-place
Of age and death, pride and hypocrisy!

151.
Just as a royal chariot gaily decked
Falls to decay, so grows this body old;
But Truth and Norm old age cannot assail,
The holy ones indeed know no decay.

152.
Just like an ox, the witless man grows old;
His flesh grows, but his wits do not increase.

153-4.
Thro' many a round of birth and death I ran,
Nor found the builder that I sought. Life's stream
Is birth and death and birth, with sorrow filled.
Now, housebuilder, thou'rt seen! No more shalt build!
Broken are all thy rafters, split thy beam!
All that made up this mortal self is gone;
Mind hath slain craving; I have crossed the stream![1]

155.
They who in youth have never trod the way
Of righteousness, nor garnered wisdom's store.
Like herons in a fishless pool decay.

156.
They who in youth have never trod the way
Of righteousness, nor garnered wisdom's store.
Like broken bows, lie weeping their lost day.

[1] The triumphant words of the Buddha, when at last He attained enlightenment, Nibbāna, beneath the Bo-tree.