Voice of the Buddha
By
GURDIAL MALLIK
All of a
sudden the wind freshened up, throwing the trees into utter confusion, so that
their tops waved furiously like the heads of demons at daggers drawn.
Then there
was a pause, akin to the air of expectancy at dawn.
A solitary
cloud in the sky assumed the aspect of the shining one.
The leaves
rustled in rejoicing at His coming. Their resonance sounded like the chanting
of “Victory to Thee!” “Victory
to Thee!”
Soon after
silence supervened.
And in my
soul’s vision, I saw the Compassionate One, sitting on an ochre-aspected seat
and the ochre-robed pilgrims around in the shape of a lucky horse-shoe.
Lo ! there
was a whirl of the golden wheel.
He opened
His smile-lit lips and exclaimed in a silvery voice:
“Children
of the Light, let your souls canticle be, constant compassion to the foolish,
the fanatical and the fratricidal. For, the passions of ignorance,
arrogance and anger and avarice can be conquered only by amity and association
of understanding.”
The wheel
ceased whirling.
The
Compassionate One rose to depart.
The
pilgrims bent and bowed in salutation. And as their illumined eyes espied Him
returning to His Himalayan Home, their hearts burst out into the ecstatic
exclamation, “Victory to Thee!” “Victory to Thee!”