Miss Buddha by Ulf Wolf Page A

banks, but then Siddhattha saw the funeral rite, too, and
would not be led aside. Instead, he wanted a closer look. What
could Ananda do? Princely wishes reign supreme.
    Arrived at the pyre, Siddhattha looked down
at the very still man, dressed in fresh linen, decorated with newly
cut, still fragrant yellow and white flowers.
    Two women sang a soft hymn, while the men
prepared the fire, and soon the base of the pyre was speaking its
own language of snaps and sparks. Smoke rose, and the edge of new
linen that had unfolded caught fire with a hiss.
    Siddhattha, stunned by the sight, could not
take his eyes of the face that did not react at all to so much warm
strangeness.
    “What is wrong with him?” asked the
Prince.
    The little congregation—having recognized
the Prince—did not know whom he was addressing, perhaps the Prince
did not either. None answered.
    Until Ananda did. “He is dead,
Siddhattha.”
    “Dead?”
    “Yes, Siddhattha. The body ages, then it
sickens, then dies. It is what time does to life.”
    The prince did not answer. Instead he looked
from Ananda back to the corpse, now beginning to smolder under the
onslaught of flame, befouling the smoke with strange odors speaking
of what once was but no longer.
    They made their way back toward the palace
in silence, Siddhattha, now dark of eye and of mind, much consumed
by what he had seen.
     
    Within sight of the palace the two friends
were approached by a thin, smiling man, dressed in a clean but much
worn robe, alms-bowl in hand.
    Noticing Siddhattha, the man said, “You seem
troubled, friend.”
    Siddhattha looked down into the most
tranquil face he had ever seen.
    “I am,” answered the Prince.
    “Tell me,” said the ascetic.
    “Yesterday,” said Siddhattha, “I saw an old
woman. This morning I saw a leper. And just now I saw a
corpse.”
    “Yes,” said the smiling man, and nodded.
“Yes.” Then said no more.
    When Siddhattha, too, would not find words,
the smiling man briefly touched the Prince’s shoulder, then walked
away, still as tranquil a presence as Siddhattha had ever seen.
    The two men watched the ascetic—who never
once looked back—walk away. Finally, Siddhattha asked, “Who was
that?”
    “He is a holy man, an ascetic,” said
Ananda.
    “He seems not concerned about anything.”
    When Ananda said nothing, Siddhattha added,
“And untroubled.”
    “That is their way.”
    “That is my way,” said the Prince after a
brief silence.
    :
    Thus it came to pass that at the age of
twenty-nine Siddhattha Gotama, the once-to-be heir of a small, but
prosperous kingdom, took a long and meaningful look at the palace,
at his wife, at his son, at his father the King, at the beauty of
the gardens, at the abundance that did its very best—but failed—to
cover up the underlying and much larger truth: things are born,
they grow, they decline, and pass away. And he saw that there is no
hiding this truth under any manner of ease. He saw that there is no
hiding from it, no escaping it.
    And at seeing this, the palace life struck
him as confining, as one large lie, which he could no longer abide.
That day he told Suddhodana that he was leaving. He would pursue
the life of an ascetic, to seek a permanent truth.
    No manner of pleading, promises, nor even
threats would change his mind.
    He asked Ananda if he would join him, but
Ananda declined. Although he was sympathetic to Siddhattha’s
decision, there was much he had yet to do and accomplish that he
could not abandon.
    “As you will,” said Siddhattha. “Perhaps
we’ll meet again.”
     
    And so, early one morning Siddhattha slowly
opened the door to his wife’s chamber, where his child slept as
well, and from the doorway took one long last glimpse at them,
knowing full well that if he woke them to say goodbye, he would
likely not be able to leave, he loved them too much. Instead he
blew two kisses in their direction, one for his wife, and one for
his son, then turned away and left he