You’ve journeyed the stages of life,

and now you set out to meet Yama.

Along the way there’s nowhere to stay,

yet you have no supplies for the road.

Make an island of yourself!

Swiftly strive, learn to be wise!

Purged of stains, flawless,

you’ll not come again to rebirth and old age.

A smart person would purge

their own stains gradually,

bit by bit, moment by moment,

like a smith smelting silver.

It is the rust born on the iron

that eats away the place it arose.

And so it is their own deeds

that lead the overly-ascetic to a bad place.

Not rehearsing is the stain of hymns.

The stain of houses is neglect.

Laziness is the stain of beauty.

A guard’s stain is negligence.

Misconduct is a woman’s stain.

A giver’s stain is stinginess.

Bad qualities are a stain

in this world and the next.

But a worse stain than these

is ignorance, the worst stain of all.

Having given up that stain,

be without stains, mendicants!