Verse II

rnyog bral dwangs pa'i chu rgyun gyis
lus can gdung ba zhi byed ltar
legs bshad gsar pa'i bdud rtsi yis
blo ldan skye bo dbugs dbyung bya

Just as the clear flowing river, free of contamination, pacifies the thirst of embodied beings, so the elixir of unsullied and elegant speech shall breathe relief into sentient beings.

Alternatives:

Just as the clear flowing river, free of contamination, pacifies the yet unfulfilled desires of embodied beings, so the immortal elixir of unsullied, elegant speech shall breathe relief into sentient beings endowed with conceptual mind.

Textual Notes:

I like the flow of the short version, but the long version is more of a direct translation (I’m always a fan of direct translations).  So what’s lost in the short version?  1) the juxtaposition of lus can and blo ldan – the physical and metaphysical respectively and 2) the more intricate meaning of gdung ba which is spelled out in the alternate version.

Cultural Notes:

I translate bdud rtsi as either elixir or immortal elixir, but that glances over the root words which hold a lot of imagery key to this verse.  bdud means demon; more specifically, the demon Mara who dwells in samsara and tries to prevent the Buddha from attaining enlightenment.  Just like in the picture above, images of the wheel of life in Tibet almost always depict the wheel clutched in the jaws and limbs of Mara.  An elixir against Mara, this bdud rtsi, is literally equated to the words (elegant speech – legs bshad) spoken in Tibetan Buddhist texts – including this poem. 

Also notice that the author is going through each word from the title and giving a little explanation using simile; for example, the first verse talks about the waves, or rlabs phreng, and now in the second verse he talks about elegant speech.

Signing off in Lhasa, Miss A.