“ SABBE PI DUKKHAM  ” 
 
(Everything is Sorrow) 
 
A LESSON FROM EURIPIDES 
 
Written in Lamma Sayadaw Kyoung, Akyab 
 
LAUGHTER in the faces of the people 
Running round the theatre of music 
When the cunning actors play the Bacchae, 
Greets the gay attire and gait of Pentheus, 
Pentheus by his blasphemy deluded, 
Pentheus caught already in the meshes 
Of the fate that means to catch and crush him, 
Pentheus going forth with dance and revel, 
Soon by Bassarids (wild joys of Nature) 
To be hunted.  Ai !  the body mangled 
By the fatal fury of the Maenads 
Led by Agave his maddened mother 
(Nature’s self).  But this the people guess not, 
Only see the youth in woman’s raiment, 
Feignèd tresses drooping from his forehead, 
Awkward with unwonted dress, rude waving 
Aye the light spear tipped with mystic pine-cone ; 
Hear his boast who lifts the slender thyrsus : 
“ I could bear the mass of swart Cithaeron, 
 
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