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Milarepa
The
Suffering of Birth
"I
do not know how to observe the suffering of birth, " said Shindormo,
"Please instruct me how to meditate upon it."
In answer,
the Jetsun sang:
My
faithful patroness, I will
Explain the suffering of birth.
The wanderer in the Bardo plane
Is the Alaya Consciousness (note 1)
Driven by lust and hatred
It enters a mother's womb.
Therein
it feels like a fish
In a rock's crevice caught,
Sleeping in blood and yellow fluid,
It is pillowed in discharges,
Crammed in filth, it suffers pain.
A bad body from a bad Karma is born.
Though
remembering past lives,
It cannot say a single word.
Now scorched by heat,
Now frozen by the cold,
In nine months it emerges
From the womb in pain excruciating,
As if pulled out gripped by pliers.
When from the womb its head is squeezed,
The pain is like being thrown into a bramble pit.
The tiny body on the mother's lap,
Feels like a sparrow grappled by a hawk.
When from the baby's tender body
The blood and filth are being cleansed,
The pain is like being flayed alive.
When the umbilical cord is cut,
It feels as though the spine was severed.
When wrapped in the cradle it feels bound
By chains, imprisoned in a dungeon.
He
who realizes not the truth of No-arising (note 2)
Never can escape from the dread pangs of birth.
There
is no time to postpone devotion:
When one dies one's greatest need
Is the divine Dharma
You should then exert yourself
To practise Buddha's Teaching.
Note
1
The 'Store' Consciousness, the function of which is to preserve the
'seeds' of mental impressions. Memory and learning are made possible because
of this consciousness.
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Note
2
There is realm, O bhikkhus,…(where) there is no coming or going
or remaining, or deceasing or arising…this is the end of suffering."
(Udana 80-80)
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