On the Perishability of Everything

Sri Rāma

1. Thus, in this great mind of mine, burnt by the forest fires of faults and sins, no wish for pleasures is flashing. A mirage cannot be seen in a lake.

2. -4. Day by day, the state of this world is becoming more and more disagreeable and distasteful, like the pungency of a creeper enveloping a neem tree. Day by day, wickedness is increasing; generosity and goodness are decreasing. O king, the minds of people are becoming hard and harsh, like a thorny "Karanja". Traditions are slipping and this world is breaking away like a dried "similika" creeper without any noise.

5. -9. O lord of munis, kingdoms and pleasures are full of miseries. It is therefore better to seek solitude. Gardens, women, wealth do not give me joy or pleasure. I want peace of mind. O sir, pleasures are transient. Desires are unbearable. Mind is waversome. How can I be delivered of these and attain peace? I do not rejoice or greet death. Nor do I rejoice life. I would like to stay as I am, without any fever or anguish. What is there for me in kingdoms, pleasures and desires. All are due to ego-sense. I am free from it.

10. -14. The sequence of births is firmly bound with knots of senses. Whoever can get unknotted, liberates himself from this bondage. He is a great man. Cupid churns the mind with the attractions of women. It is like an elephant stamping on tender lotuses. If one does not cure the mind now, when will it be possible hereafter? Sensuality is poison. Poison kills only one body, but sensuality kills through all the births. Pleasures and pains, joys and sorrows, relatives and friends - none of these bind a Jnani.

15. -18. O Jnani, who knows the pros and cons, cause and effect of things, I want to become a knower of Brahman. Please show me the way to deliver myself from fear and pain. This fierce, terrifying forest of ignorance is full of 'vasana'-nets and thorns of sorrows. There are too many chasms and calamities. O muni, I can bear being sawed by a saw. But I cannot bear the sawing by sensuous things and desires."This is, this is not" - Such an illusory activity convulses the mind the way a heap of dust is whirled by wind.

19. -23. The pearls, called beings are strung into a chain by the string of desires. The best pearl in that is pure mind. The pearl necklace of world adorns the rogue elephant of Time. I want to tear this necklace the way a lion tears the necklace of an elephant. O knower of Truth, please shatter the darkness in my foggy forest of heart with the lamp of knowledge. O great soul, there is no mental disease, no desire, that cannot be dispelled by association with noble people. Is there a moonlight which cannot dispell darkness at night? Life is transient like a water drop in a cloud. Pleasures are like lightnings inside a cloud. Youthful dalliances are ever-changing like flowing cascades. This kind of thinking is firmly stamped and embedded in my ever peaceful mind.