Chapter IX: Story on Enmity between Two Persons

Two persons, in hatred and fighting engaged,And looked on each other, like leopards enraged.To avoid one another, so far did they fly,That the Earth was too small for them, under the sky.At the head of one, Fate with his army arrived,And him of enjoying more pleasure deprived.This, delight to the heart of his enemy gave ;A short time thereafter, he passed by his grave.The cell of his tomb, he saw plastered with clay ;He had seen his gilt house on the previous day.By the strength of his arm, with malicious intent,He a slab from the face of the sepulchre rent.He saw his crowned head lying inside the pit,And his world-seeing eyes filled entirely with grit.His body confined in the tomb-prison lay;His corpse food for worms and the greedy ant's prey.From the sky's revolutions his full-moon-like face,To a sharp-pointed crescent had now given place ;And towards him, time had such tyranny shown,That his cypress-like form, like a toothpick had grown.The palms of his hands and his fingers of strength,By time had their pieces disjointed, at length.His heart for him sympathy showed, in such way,That the tears from his eyes wrought his dust into clay.He regretted the manner he served him from spite;On the slab of his grave he desired them to write :"At any one's death, from rejoicing refrain !For after he dies you a moment remain."Some one heard the remark who with wisdom was stored,And wept, saying, "Oh, Thou Omnipotent Lord !It were strange did Thy mercy to him not extend,Whose foe for him bitterly wept, like a friend."One day will our bodies in like manner turnThat our enemies' hearts, too, will over them burn.Perhaps the Friend's heart will to me mercy show,When He sees me forgiven, at last, by my foe !Such a state of the skull will immediately rise,That you'd say, it had never contained any eyes.I struck an earth mound with a pick-axe, one day ;A cry of distress, in my ears seemed to say:"Take a little more care, if you're manly, I pray!There are ear-tips and eyes; face and head in this clay."