What laughter, why joy,
when constantly aflame?
Enveloped in darkness,
don’t you look for a lamp?
146
Look at the beautified image,
a heap of festering wounds, shored up:
ill, but the object
of many resolves,
where there is nothing
lasting or sure.
147
Worn out is this body,
a nest of diseases, dissolving.
This putrid conglomeration
is bound to break up,
for life is hemmed in with death.
148
On seeing these bones
discarded
like gourds in the fall,
pigeon-gray:
what delight?
149
A city made of bones,
plastered over with flesh & blood,
whose hidden treasures are:
pride & contempt,
aging & death.
150
Even royal chariots
well-embellished
get run down,
and so does the body
succumb to old age.
But the Dhamma of the good
doesn’t succumb to old age:
the good let the civilized know.
151
This unlistening man
matures like an ox.
His muscles develop,
his discernment not.
152
Through the round of many births I roamed
without reward,
without rest,
seeking the house-builder.
Painful is birth again
& again.
House-builder, you’re seen!
You will not build a house again.
All your rafters broken,
the ridge pole dismantled,
immersed in dismantling, the mind
has attained to the end of craving.
153-154
Neither living the chaste life
nor gaining wealth in their youth,
they waste away like old herons
in a dried-up lake
depleted of fish.
Neither living the chaste life
nor gaining wealth in their youth,
they lie around,
misfired from the bow,
sighing over old times.
155-156
Read this translation of Dhp 146-156 Jarāvagga: Aging by Bhikkhu Ṭhanissaro on DhammaTalks.org. Or read a different translation on SuttaCentral.net, SuttaFriends.org, Ancient-Buddhist-Texts.net or AccessToInsight.org. Or explore the Pali on DigitalPaliReader.online.
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