The Buddhas Of Bamiyan. Poem by Dónall Dempsey

Koh-I-Babu
Grandfather Mountain

casts its gentle shadow
over everything.

Both man and stone
his children.

The Buddhas of Bamiyan
guard the valley

as they have done
for 14 centuries

gazing
through time

beyond

into eternity.

But nothing
lasts for ever

not even
eternity.

I laugh to find
there is a relic

of the finger
of the Buddha

hastily scraped out of
his funeral pyre

this human need
to hold all that is

passing.

This of all faiths
pointing out
the impermanence of things

clinging to
the Buddha’s finger.

Now the kohl-eyed
Taliban

reduce the giant guardians
to nothing

giving the world’s press
a front seat

as eternity
is destroyed.

The statues
coming alive
in their very death

burning into
men’s minds

living for ever
in their destruction.

Now the Buddha’s burning finger
points out

that nothing

lasts forever.