Poetry, nature and meditation in the Vessantarajātaka

The article proposes an interpretation of the verse portions included in the Vessantarajātaka. The majority of the gāthās refer to nature, through both denotative and connotative modes. In particular, four long sequences seem to be eminently descriptive and catalogical, but concomitantly they picture nature as an idyllic and fabulous reality. The question is whether such poetry complies with symbolical intents, conferring the meaning “other” on the text, or whether it must be considered a mere aesthetic exercise, besides the Vessantara story. Taking into account the fact that this story is narrated in the form of a Buddhist jātaka, it is possible to hypothesize a Buddhist “point of view”. Idyllic and catalogical poetry can be a sample of paradoxical poetry based on devices such as phonetic play, pun, antiphrasis, double-meaning. They turn the text into a net of manifold meaning. It is precisely reality as it actually is, with no “other” value: according to Buddhist doctrine reality is a fluid core of intrinsically impermanent beings. Therefore such poetry can be related to meditative practices leading to the attainment of awareness of reality as it is, that is to say to “liberating insight”.