The Compassionate Prince

Lord Buddha continues to fascinate the imagination and thoughts of men across the globe even after nearly 2600 years of his death. His appeal cuts across religions, races, continents, castes, creeds, etc.

One of the finest aspects of Buddhism that has interested me, other than its noble tenets, is its unusual peaceful coexistance with the other faiths. One could hardly hear Buddhists getting embroiled in religious polemics whether doctrinal or other airy claims over the souls of men. This is a poem about Lord Buddha that I had penned during my college days, torn off and pasted here…

The Compassionate Prince

Show me a star,

I will follow it to its grave.

And I will scatter my days in the wind

To get a millennium of ecstasy in his company.

The state of nirvana is akin to death,

A comma yearning for a full stop.

A stony statue beneath the Bo tree_

Insensible to the sparrow at its benumbed hand.

But the days of struggle were steep and full,

Each moment charged with zeal and passion

And endless treasures of compassion

Of love, not blind as of a bouncing calf

But an all-seeing and all-embracing might.

An old man, a sick man, and a corpse

Are the triumvirs that shook your world

A court scandalized_

And a family of wife and child left behind.

Why for Siddhartha did you disown your world

To wipe our tears

For we have nothing else to drink _

In this parched up world.

But whenever the chariot of Ashoka

Goes brandishing past the Kalinga grounds

I hear your silent dharma at work from up the skies

Turning the wheel in a missionary zeal.

                                                   George Manjooran