The White Elephant Dream Poem by Mark Heathcote

After the lotus blossom flowered
the White elephant floats out of her sepals
seven days later, Queen Maya died.
The White elephant doesn't mix with jackals.

He doesn't witness death, hunger, or sickness
not until he's in his mid-to late-twenties
not until he wanders outside the palace walls
witness's people-suffering dying eddies.

Does he question his mortality?
Now faced with a man's dead severed skull
does the White elephant his death contemplate
how can an emancipated body like a lotus unfurl?

Find spiritual harmony - enlightenment.
How does one reach a state-of-true Nevada?
After some six years of profound hardship,
he's no closer to understanding finding karma.

Not until he sat meditating under the Bodhi Tree
many days, not until he was shown a middle way
did he find what he was searching for?
Never would he be born again, be anyone's protégé.

He found peace in the blossoms of his serenity
where the petals of the Bodhi tree rained on his brow
he found an explanation that explained everything
the dream his mother had was, after all, like the Tao.