Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE BRONZE BUDDHA, by AMELIA WOODWARD TRUESDELL


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE BRONZE BUDDHA, by                    
First Line: On the lotus blossom the buddha is sitting
Last Line: Of stillness and dreamless sleep.
Subject(s): Buddhism; Statues; Buddha; Buddhists


On the lotus blossom the Buddha is sitting,
With the cobra's hood on his head;
The sun and the moon behind him enfigured
In a bronze of gold and of red.
For the half of a thousand years he had sat there
When the Bethlehem hymn was sung;
To Nirvana's passionless peace he was passing
When the Christ-Child's anthem rung.

On his forehead the spot of the chosen immortal,
Revered as the seal divine;
Ample-lipped is his mouth, but no human emotion
Breaks the fullness of curving line.
And narrow his eyes, but life-shot, and gazing
With a haunting calm to your own;
On his lap the folded fingers are lying,
The labors of man to them unknown.

And the nerveless type of a dream he embodies,
The inertia of unpulsed soul;
But a mystery vast as the years immemorial
Which into the silence roll.
And illusions as subtle as orient attars
Across the lulled senses creep,
Till my spirit is weighted with æons and æons
Of stillness and dreamless sleep.





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