In Photos: India's Holy Men Wash Away Their Sins

I saw two sadhus naked
While walking down a street,
Their balls beneath them swinging,
Hung high above their feet.

And as these naga sadhus,
Both confidently strode,
The crowd who saw them shouted,
"Those two men are unclothed!"

The sadhus still kept pacing,
With eyes fixed straight ahead,
As if, although still waking,
They were already dead.

It's suicide by walking
With skin bared to the world,
The men are hung by stalking
The streets with junk unfurled.

Their skin is pierced by daggers
Of glares from passers by,
For every step they take is
An insult to the eye.

The sadhu has no reason
To walk through world unclothed
Except to show that he is
No more than we suppose:

A man with rod and testes,
Two nipples and two beards.
Though everyone is equal
The sight of them is weird.

It's rude, yes, they do protest
To us that we are wrong
To raise our voice in insult
And on them put upon

Our vices and our virtues,
Our judgment and our stones,
Our sense of what is decent
As others walk alone

Through streets, not wearing clothing,
In gutters without food,
In basements, chained with shackles.
Who, then, now is rude?

These men who walk streets naked,
Who hide no ugly truth,
Are these two who will summon
A righteous mob to move?

Still, too, I think these these sadhus
Are no more good than me,
They, too, they have their reasons
For baring more than feet.

Perhaps they feel too guilty,
Perhaps they need my love,
Perhaps they, too, are broken
By broken hands that shoved

Them to a life of penance
In which they have no choice
But walk through streets abandoned
By mother's loving voice.

Let's kill them and not worry,
For they have robbed our time,
It took me half an hour
To get so far in rhyme.

It may be thirty minutes
Is more time than they're worth,
For I have more to do, now,
Concerning my own birth

Than think of two nude sadhus
Who, naked, walk through streets,
Eliciting these judgments
From all those who they meet.

Let's kill them, like that woman,
Who slept with many men,
Surrounded by an angry mob,
Till Jesus did step in,

And said, yes, you're a sinner,
Yet these are sinners, too,
Who hold these stones in judgment,
And soon will throw at you.

Sadhu, who's the sinner?
Yes, I think you know.
It's wrong, I think, to judge you,
But wrong to naked go

Through streets to stir reaction
From people who must view,
The truth that you are showing
That must be seen in you.

There is a problem, Ego.
It's there, too, yes, in me.
I know: I wrote this poem.
This isn't hard to see.

I see you walk by naked,
And if you've read this far,
You see, that I'm, too, suffering
From sins that have left scars

Upon my naked body
And on my naked soul,
And though the naked truth is kind,
It hurts others, too.

Be who you are, yes naked,
But guard the things you say
To people who are naked, too,
Though clothed in fine array

Of vestments and status,
Of virtue and of vice,
For humans all are covered,
With dead skin, and with lice

That crawl across our bodies
And feed on flesh and blood
And give to us each other's
Diseases, clothed or nude.

What is the point, these sadhus?
What is the point, this rhyme?
Is it that we are naked,
All of us, all the time?

Or is it that, though naked,
We have compassion, too,
For angry, violent Muslim,
For stingy, greedy Jew,

For selfish, righteous 'Murcan,
For stuffy, gin-soaked Brit,
For cold, abrasive Russian,
Dumb sadhus, without wit?

These words are worse than bullets
That fly through flesh and bone.
They pierce through thicker clothing,
Than robe by sadhu sown.

These sadhus I saw naked,
Though troubled, they may be,
Have taught me how to listen,
And be a better me.

I worry that these sadhus
Will never find their peace,
But I'll give them my blessing
As they walk through my streets.