Interlude with Jack

But there is a difference between the original Buddha of India, and the Buddha of Vietnam who just shaves his hair and puts on a yellow robe and is a communist agitating agent. The original Buddha wouldn't even walk on young grass so that he wouldn't destroy it. He was born in Gorakhpur, the son of the consul of the invading Persian hordes. And he was called Sage of the Warriors, and he had seventeen thousand broads dancing for him all night, holding out flowers, saying, “You want to smell it, my lord?” He says, “Git outta here you whore.” He laid a lot of them you know. But by the time he was thirty-one years old he got sick and tired . . . his father was protecting him from what was going on outside the town. And so he went out on a horse, against his father's orders and he saw a woman dying—a man being burnt on a ghat. And he said, “What is all this death and decay?” The servant said,”That is the way things go on. Your father was hiding you from the way things go on.”

He says, “What? My father!! Get my horse, saddle my horse! Ride me into the forest!” They ride into the forest; he says, “Now take the saddle off the horse. Put it on your horse, hang it on . . . Take my horse by the rein and ride back to the castle and tell my father I'll never see him again!” And the servant, Channa, cried, he said, “I'll never see you again. I don't care! Go on! Shoosh! Get away!!”

He spent seven years in the forest. Biting his teeth together. Nothing happened. Tormenting himself with starvation. He said, “I will keep my teeth bit together until I find the cause of death.” Then one day he was stumbling across the Rapti River, and he fainted in the river. And a young girl came by with a bowl of milk and said, “My lord, a bowl of milk.” [Slurppp] He said, “That gives me great energy, thank you my dear.” Then he went and sat under the Bo tree. Figuerosa. The fig tree. He said, “Now . . . [demonstrates posture] I will cross my legs . . . and grit my teeth until I find the cause of death.” Two o'clock in the morning, one hundred thousand phantoms assailed him. He didn't move. Three o'clock in the morning, the great blue ghosts!! Arrghhh!!! All accosted him. (You see I am really Scottish.) Four o'clock in the morning the mad maniacs of hell . . . came out of manhole covers . . . in New York City. You know Wall Street where the steam comes out? You know Wall Street, where the manhole covers . . . steam comes up? You take off them covers—yaaaaaahhh!!!!! Six o'clock, everything was peaceful—the birds started to trill, and he said, “Aha! The cause of death . . . the cause of death is birth.”

Simple? So he started walking down the road to Banaras in India . . . with long hair, like you, see.

So, three guys. One says, “Hey, here comes Buddha there who, uh, starved with us in the forest. When he sits down here on that bucket, don't wash his feet.” So Buddha sits down on the bucket . . . The guy rushes up and washes his feet. “Why dost thou wash his feet?” Buddha says, “Because I go to Banaras to beat the drum of life.” “And what is that?” “That the cause of death is birth.” “What do you mean?” “I'll show you.”

A woman comes up with a dead baby in her arms. Says, “Bring my child back to life if you are the Lord.” He says, “Sure I'll do that anytime. Just go and find one family in ´Sravasti [FLAT LINE OVER THE FIRST A AND THE I PLEASE THANKS!] that ain't had a death in the last five years. Get a mustard seed from them and bring it to me. And I'll bring your child back to life.” She went all over town, man, two million people, ´Sravasti [DITTO!] the town was, a bigger town than Banaras by the way, and she came back and said, “I can't find no such family. They've all had deaths within five years.” He said, “Then, bury your baby.”

Then, his jealous cousin, Devadatta (that's Ginsberg you see . . . I am Buddha and Ginsberg is Devadatta), gets this elephant drunk . . . great big bull elephant drunk on whiskey. The elephant goes up—[trumpets like elephant going up] with a big trunk, and Buddha comes up in the road and gets the elephant and goes like this [kneels]. And the elephant kneels down. “You are buried in sorrow's mud! Quiet your trunk! Stay there!” He's an elephant trainer. Then Devadatta rolled a big boulder over a cliff. And it almost hit Buddha's head. Just missed. Boooom! He says, “That's Devadatta again.” Then Buddha went like this [paces back and forth] in front of his boys, you see. Behind him was his cousin that loved him . . . Ananda . . . which means “love” in Sanskrit [keeps pacing]. This is what you do in jail to keep in shape.

I know a lot of stories about Buddha, but I don't know exactly what he said every time. But I know what he said about the guy who spit at him. He said, “Since I can't use your abuse you may have it back.” He was great.

[Kerouac plays piano. Drinks are served.]

From the Paris Review