O YE who tread the Narrow Way | |
| By Tophet-flare to Judgment Day, | |
| Be gentle when “the heathen” pray | |
| To Buddha at Kamakura! | |
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| To him the Way, the Law, apart, | 5 |
| Whom Maya held beneath her heart, | |
| Ananda’s Lord, the Bodhisat, | |
| The Buddha of Kamakura. | |
| |
| For though he neither burns nor sees, | |
| Nor hears ye thank your Deities, | 10 |
| Ye have not sinned with such as these, | |
| His children at Kamakura, | |
| |
| Yet spare us still the Western joke | |
| When joss-sticks turn to scented smoke | |
| The little sins of little folk | 15 |
| That worship at Kamakura— | |
| |
| The grey-robed, gay-sashed butterflies | |
| That flit beneath the Master’s eyes. | |
| He is beyond the Mysteries | |
| But loves them at Kamakura. | 20 |
| |
| And whoso will, from Pride released, | |
| Contemning neither creed nor priest, | |
| May feel the Soul of all the East | |
| About him at Kamakura. | |
| |
| Yea, every tale Ananda heard, | 25 |
| Of birth as fish or beast or bird, | |
| While yet in lives the Master stirred, | |
| The warm wind brings Kamakura. | |
| |
| Till drowsy eyelids seem to see | |
| A-flower ’neath her golden htee | 30 |
| The Shwe-Dagon flare easterly | |
| From Burmah to Kamakura, | |
| |
| And down the loaded air there comes | |
| The thunder of Thibetan drums, | |
| And droned—“Om mane padme hums”— 1 | 35 |
| A world’s-width from Kamakura. | |
| |
| Yet Brahmans rule Benares still, | |
| Buddh-Gaya’s ruins pit the hill, | |
| And beef-fed zealots threaten ill | |
| To Buddha and Kamakura. | 40 |
| |
| A tourist-show, a legend told, | |
| A rusting bulk of bronze and gold, | |
| So much, and scarce so much, ye hold | |
| The meaning of Kamakura? | |
| |
| But when the morning prayer is prayed, | 45 |
| Think, ere ye pass to strife and trade, | |
| Is God in human image made | |
| No nearer than Kamakura? | |
