Oye who treated the Narrow Way <br />By Tophet-flare to Judgment Day, <br />Be gentle when "the heathen" pray <br /> To Buddha at Kamakura! <br /> <br />To him the Way, the Law, apart, <br />Whom Maya held beneath her heart, <br />Ananda's Lord, the Bodhisat, <br /> The Buddha of Kamakura. <br /> <br />For though he neither burns nor sees, <br />Nor hears ye thank your Deities, <br />Ye have not sinned with such as these, <br /> His children at Kamakura, <br /> <br />Yet spare us still the Western joke <br />When joss-sticks turn to scented smoke <br />The little sins of little folk <br /> That worship at Kamakura -- <br /> <br />The grey-robed, gay-sashed butterflies <br />That flit beneath the Master's eyes. <br />He is beyond the Mysteries <br /> But loves them at Kamakura. <br /> <br />And whoso will, from Pride released, <br />Contemning neither creed nor priest, <br />May feel the Soul of all the East <br /> About him at Kamakura. <br /> <br />Yea, every tale Ananda heard, <br />Of birth as fish or beast or bird, <br />While yet in lives the Master stirred, <br /> The warm wind brings Kamakura. <br /> <br />Till drowsy eyelids seem to see <br />A-flower 'neath her golden htee <br />The Shwe-Dagon flare easterly <br /> From Burmah to Kamakura, <br /> <br />And down the loaded air there comes <br />The thunder of Thibetan drums, <br />And droned -- "Om mane padme hums" -- <br /> A world's-width from Kamakura. <br /> <br />Yet Brahmans rule Benares still, <br />Buddh-Gaya's ruins pit the hill, <br />And beef-fed zealots threaten ill <br /> To Buddha and Kamakura. <br /> <br />A tourist-show, a legend told, <br />A rusting bulk of bronze and gold, <br />So much, and scarce so much, ye hold <br /> The meaning of Kamakura? <br /> <br />But when the morning prayer is prayed, <br />Think, ere ye pass to strife and trade, <br />Is God in human image made <br /> No nearer than Kamakura?<br /><br />Rudyard Kipling<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/buddha-at-kamakura/
