Here is a poem written within human history, a Hindu secret that sustains the stages the soul passes through. This poetic condition opens the way to evolution. (Poems in italics are taken from other texts and have not been spell-checked.)

THE PILGRIM'S POEM [of Hindu origin]

How much suffering during the cycle of my lives! Before becoming a fetus in my mother's womb, eight million four hundred times, I emerged from the womb and here I am, destitute, a beggar. Here I am, dependent on a foreign hand: like a net holding the sum of my lives, the balance of my deeds binds me, I whirl under the lash of their power. Nothing to fill my belly, no rest, no place in the village reserved for me. Without strength, without hope, thus, my God, I am shaken like rice in a pan. Countless ages have seen me in this state, I know not how many more are yet to come. No stopping; the irrevocable movement begins anew, even at the end of the cycle, no change for me.

Who will bear my misfortunes? Who will take upon themselves my heavy burden? Your name is the ferryman on the river of the world, you believe in the help of the one who invokes you. It is time for you to come running to me, I am, Oh! Nârâyana, a poor man in need, do not look upon my faults? Tuka begs for your mercy. The pyre will consume the offering of your body, but neither the sum of your actions or your past lives nor your place in the cosmic cycle will be burned. It will continue to touch you, like the wheel of the well; one bucket fills it, another empties it. Burn your human condition in the five fires of sacrifice, your soul will attain rest of itself. Recite Nârâyana, so that your lips may open to repeat it, and it will annihilate all misfortunes, all deeds to be paid for, birth, growth, and death. Alone in the forest, where heat and cold impose hardship, bend your body to its aptitudes, your mind to meditation, demonstrate your self-mastery? No matter how much you do—pilgrimages, acts of charity, vows, and sacrifices—you will not attain spiritual enlightenment.

Neither pleasures nor pains will cease, nor will calamities, birth, growth, or death. Even in your hermitage, you will endlessly suffer from desires, anger, or pride. Duties and prohibitions weigh upon your shoulders; in disputes, you blame or flatter, faults that will cling to you like a plaster. These trifles are a source of sin; Abandon illusory delicacies, place yourself under the protection of the saints, and remain in your present situation.

Will I attain salvation? Will Narayana grant me grace? Tell me, saints, my friends, that my heart may find rest. Will the burden of my past be lifted? Will my good and bad deeds wither away? In my desperate desire to know this essential mystery, I have exhausted myself. Will my inner torments cease? Will my soul settle in purity? I do not know what my end will be. Will I obtain the reward of kissing the feet of my God in my abode?

Will my throat tighten beneath His precious hand that caresses me? Will my eyes know the coolness of beholding His happiness? Will my aspirations be fulfilled? I do not know what my future holds. Such is my constant worry, night and day, my anguish, I am powerless, says Tuka, to obtain this fruit without fail. How can one pluck the pure without the impure? Between flesh and skin, nothing. No worth makes one small or great before God. Wells, brooks, streams, rivers, is water any different? Does the sun choose between its rays? Milk has no different shades of white. Only one way to burn for the fire. A good jug remains a jug, whether one puts sugar, ambrosia, or poison in it. You tell yourself: when I am free, when all worry has left me, then I will enter solitude to pray. But desire will always pursue you like a dog if you remain in this restless world. Finally, your attachment to the world will destroy you, and you will climb back into the pit of a new existence.