Not having lived the holy life nor acquired wealth in youth, they lie like broken bows, lamenting the past.

Senti cāpātikhīṇāva — they lie like broken bows: cāpa is the bow. The broken bow (atikhīṇa) has lost its tension, its capacity to launch arrows. The aged body without spiritual practice or resources is like a bow that has lost all its functionality.

Purāṇāni anutthunaṃ — lamenting the past: anutthunaṃ is to lament, sigh, groan. Old people without practice spend their time remembering with nostalgia what they were and lamenting what they did not do. This lamentation is the clearest sign of a life not taken advantage of.

This verse closes the vagga on old age with an image that combines the physical (broken bows, decrepit bodies) with the psychological (lamentation, nostalgia). The implicit teaching is the urgency of practice in the present: don’t wait for old age to lament what was not done.

The pair 155-156 functions as compassionate warning: there is still time. Don’t be the heron in the empty pond or the broken bow that can only lament.