11. Old Age

1 What is joy, what is laughter,

2 when the flames are ever burning?

3 Swathed in darkness,

4 would you not seek a light?

1 See this fancy puppet,

2 a body built of sores,

3 diseased, obsessed over,

4 in which nothing lasts at all.

1 This body is decrepit and frail,

2 a nest of disease.

3 This foul carcass falls apart,

4 for life ends in death.

1 These dove-grey bones

2 are tossed away like

3 dried gourds in the autumn—

4 what joy is there in such a sight?

1 In this city built of bones,

2 plastered with flesh and blood,

3 old age and death are stashed away,

4 along with conceit and contempt.

1 Fancy chariots of kings wear out,

2 and even this body gets old.

3 But the truth of the good never gets old—

4 so the good proclaim to the good.

1 A person of little learning

2 ages like an ox—

3 their flesh grows,

4 but not their wisdom.

1 Transmigrating through countless rebirths,

2 I’ve journeyed without reward,

3 searching for the house-builder;

4 painful is birth again and again.

1 I’ve seen you, house-builder!

2 You won’t build a house again!

3 Your rafters are all broken,

4 your roof-peak demolished.

5 The mind, set on demolition,

6 has reached the end of cravings.

1 When young they spurned the spiritual path

2 and failed to earn any wealth.

3 Now they brood like old cranes

4 in a pond bereft of fish.

1 When young they spurned the spiritual path

2 and failed to earn any wealth.

3 Now they lie like spent arrows,

4 bemoaning over things past.