Having rested and partaken of the frugal evening meal
Ugra-sravas asked those waiting around him:
"What shall I tell you, worthy friends?
What would you be pleased to hear?
I have been to many places.
I have seen many things,
Listened to many stories, mostly real.
Is it about gods you wish to hear?
Or is it about men who were like gods?
Two generations are now gone since the great war.
But the sands of Syamantha-panchaka are still red
With the blood of great warriors.
Men who fought and died
Some valiantly
Some like cowards.
Whn the war was over the bodies of the dead
piled almost to the heavens.
Half eaten by wolves and jackals
The destiny of the monarch, to be eaten by a jackal.
To fulfill the blind egos.
Would like to hear that story?
Men such as those are born but rarely.
But once born they are committed to death
like a lover.
For, out of that great battle,
Only eight came out alive.
Five were the victors, and three the vanquished.
Those five, they died soon after, in great anguish.
With parched lips,
For none were there to give them a drop of water.
Did they win the battle, only to lose the war?
Did they lose their souls because their ego made them blind?
That story, my friends, I shall tell you.
That is a story worth hearing.
Especially, in these times,
When wars are fought agian fought
Over egos of some men.
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