Psalms of the Brethren CXCVIII: Rajadatta

A bhikkhu to the charnel-field had gone,
And there he saw a woman’s body cast
Untended ’mid the dead, the food of worms.

Most men had felt repugnance at the sight,
Seeing the corpse, the poor dead evil thing.
In me was sensual passion manifest,
And I became as blind and lost control.

But swifter from that place than seething rice
Could boiling overflow, I turned and fled;
Aside elsewhere I took my seat cross-legged,
In heedful and discriminating mood.

Thereon arose in me the deeper thought:
Attention to the fact and to the cause.
The misery of it all was manifest.
Distaste, indifference the mind possessed;

And so my heart was set at liberty.
O see the seemly order of the Norm!
The Threefold Wisdom have I made my own,
And all the Buddha bids us do is done.