Aging and Awakened

147

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.

149

A city made of bones,

plastered over with flesh & blood,

whose hidden treasures are:

pride & contempt,

aging & death.

181

Hard the winning of a human birth.

Hard the life of mortals.

Hard the chance to hear the true Dhamma.

Hard the arising of Awakened Ones.

From The Dhammapada, Sections XI:Aging and XIV: Awakened pp. 52, 61.