from the
Venerable Thích Quảng Độ
Hey!
Pain!
Do
not menace me again!
I
have known you too well! enough!
I
have met you on all my life's roads rough;
and
each time I meet you anywhere,
I
always smile a smile so fair
and
look you straight in the face without dread.
Although
you really are more awesome than Death,
with
me, you are nothing at all.
Do
not fancy it, that I fear you, to befall
so
that I should damp my righteous zest
to
lower my head before you, inhuman pest!
Do
continue to persecute me to carry out your plan:
I
have pledged not to regret my illusionary life span.
Oh,
Distress!
Do
you hear among the world's moving stream
the
swift waves of impermanence's scream?
Do
not pride yourself being unduly victorious
on
the corpses of humans unfortunate but meritorious!
For,
grossly stupid and coarse,
you
know nothing besides your force,
and
then you laugh at devastation and ruin.
The
music you listen to is lament, bewail, chagrin!
the
tea you taste teardrops of the wretch,
the
wine you sip fresh blood of your victims' fetch,
each
curtain you hang like many a mourning headband
of
writhing people you trample down and brand!
Poverty
and starvation follow each of your steps,
chains
and shackles where you come it schleps;
sunshine
becomes obscurity
to
cover with darkness all paths to futurity;
the
naive fetuses, unborn babies, cherubs,
get
aborted by you using overpopulation as cover-ups.
Oh,
Agony!
Do
you hear the complaints against your savagery
that
are resounding from cities to the countryside,
from
islands to mountainous areas nationwide,
and
from graves by souls of victims of gross injustice?
Are
you aware? that on the earth's surface
there
will be nowhere
in
the deep sea as well as in the thin air
for
you to find a long-term shelter thither to scoot
to
escape, when is duly ripe every fruit!
And
that day will definitely come as in a daze
when
humanity awakes from this current maze.
Vũ Đoài Village, on the Buddha's Birthday in 1982
Translation
by THANH-THANH