"If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away."
- Henry David Thoreau
Every time they chastise the happy-go-lucky kid,
And call her lacking in ambition, warn her of the risk
Of how she shall perish being herself, in a world,
Fuelled by the ambition of "everyone" around her;
Hope she shall smile back like the monks who held up
Their worldview to the Emperor, the Conqueror, Alexander!
Legend has many narratives, mythical or otherwise.
One is the story of how the Emperor was bemused at the
Jain monks who went on with their lives, indifferent
To the largest and the most powerful of the armies, that
Ever marched past those lands conquering, escorting
The invincible, the Emperor, the Conqueror, Alexander!
It is said that the emperor desired “to know why”,
Why the monks were so indifferent, how could they be?
The monks were summoned, the glory was described -
The scale of the ambition, the battles to conquer the world,
The years of travel, tales of the resolute army led by
The dauntless, the Emperor, the Conqueror, Alexander!
The stories whisper of how the monks smiled and
Offered the Emperor a view of their world, when they said -
“Be it any form of life, whether in air, water or on earth;
Whether an insect, an animal or a reeking mammoth carcass,
Whether a man or a woman seeking alms for their living,
Whether thy majesty, the Emperor, the Conqueror, Alexander,
One can at any moment possess only that much Earth
That one can stand on and that too till the moment passes.
These marching majestic armies, their so-called victories,
Mere nuisances to the people, the armies and even to thyself.
Despite all you think you conquered, you shall die, perish
Like us all; You too, the Emperor, the Conqueror, Alexander!”
