Just This

Sitting: Part 1 (Carl Jerome)

2011-12-01T23:20:00.010-06:00

By way of introduction...

Meditation is what charges our mindfulness battery, and mindfulness is the driving force of a clear, peaceful, calm, quiet and confident mind.

Peaceful Forest Tim Schorre

What do we just do? We just sit, still, without moving, and focus on our breath. No numbers, no words, no visualizations, no wondering about the breathing. Just noticing it go in and out: in the diaphragm, chest, or at the tip of the nostrils. When a thought, a sensation, a feeling, a sound, whatever, arises as a distraction and we notice that we are thinking or feeling or hearing, we let go of that distraction and mindfully return to observing our breath.

We don’t judge or evaluate our meditation. We just sit.

Meditation is about letting go, not attaining. How do we let go? We let go by focusing our attention on something else. For example, when we notice we are listening to a bird, we let go by simply (re)focusing on our breath.

Allow the breath to be natural. Don’t try to change it or control it. Simply breathe. Simply observe.

About Xianyang Carl Jerome

A Fox on the Fence (Sharon Meloy)

2011-12-01T23:17:00.007-06:00

Sarah Webb

So I’m learning to meditate, to become more mindful and aware of myself and the moments of my life. Doug and I are sitting in the backyard looking out over trees and yard stuff. We are not paying attention to the pretty sky or the breezy leaves because we are fizzing into an argument and I can feel my skin heat up and my eyeballs dry out. No, fire has not been known to escape my ears, but it sometimes feels like it could. I am not, at this point, capable of invoking the words of wisdom I so desperately want to learn. We are just hitting our high notes, when, very suddenly, a fox appears like a fur ball up on the fence. We are speechless and immediately quiet with wonder. A fox? What’s he doing, where’s he going, how long will he stay? The argument from seconds ago has evaporated; I still barely have a memory of it. Aw, shoot, now that I wrote that I remember the fight and I’m all sweaty again. I need that fox, where is he? That fox really had a way of snapping us out of it. Our attention turned to watching the fox as it navigated the fence line until it came to an old oak tree. It looked up into the branches and jumped. Wow. It jumped up into a tree house platform Doug had built years earlier. It sat there for the longest time observing its aerial view. Next time I’m frustrated I’m gonna call that fox to hurry up and come back to the tree house in my mind. Maybe it will help me snap out of it.

About Sharon Meloy

Is Buddhism Lots of Work? (Kim Mosley)

2011-12-01T23:15:00.005-06:00

He asked if Buddhism was lots of work. Much less than suffering was the answer.

About Kim Mosley

Scent of Sandalwood (Elizabeth Stein)

2011-12-01T23:05:00.010-06:00

Scent of sandalwood:
Does it linger on my scarf
Or are we now one?

I stare at the floor,
Seeing faces in the wood—
Rain, master sculptor!

Bright red hydrangeas
Flank the candle like guardsmen;
Where to when they die?

Robed men meditate
Until the gong calls softly:
“Time to play some golf.”

Backlit by dawn sun,
Her hair a halo of fire …
She rises to go.

About Elizabeth Stein

Fat Cat Stares at Tree (Sharon Meloy)

2011-12-01T23:04:00.006-06:00

Sarah Webb

It’s early in the morning. I just walked up a breath-stealing hill. I’m approaching the top and I see a portly but pretty gray and white cat. He is doing something that seems very uncatlike to me and so I stop. I am under a tree. The cat is on the ground facing the tree. His pink nose is only inches away from the bark. He is simply staring at the tree in front of him. Is he watching a bug? Waiting for the bark to grow? In time out? He has politely acknowledged me momentarily and then gone back to his business. I do believe this cat is a Zen cat. In my meditation group at the Zen Center, we face the wall to help diminish distraction. It does help, because if someone walks into the room late for instance, I watch them and who knows what I start thinking then. So this fat cat is setting an example for me. I’m huffing and puffing at the top of the hill and contemplating a quick sit on the ground to join this cat. It’s a bit of a lesson for me when I feel lazy about my practice. Just stop what you’re doing, stop and meditate, then continue on your way. Oh and you’ll be glad to know I didn’t really sit down then. No sense looking like the fool when half the time I already feel like one!

About Sharon Meloy

Sarah Webb

Meditation for Kids or Why I Sit? (Kim Mosley)

2011-12-01T23:00:00.009-06:00

Thursday I’m teaching meditation to a group of kids in a summer camp. I’m told that they are middle school kids, around 12–13 years old. So I wondered what I’d say to them about meditation and why someone might want to sit and face the wall as we do in the zendo.

Forty years ago I taught art to 6th graders. They were a pretty intimidating lot, being little adults, with attitudes about art that were impenetrable. I went back after that to focusing on younger kids (though I taught college kids at the same time who were always ready for adventure).

In elementary school they would send me to the cloak room when I wasn’t behaving. That seemed to be often, and my record was twice in one day. Now I go to the cloak room (zendo) almost every day to sit and face the wall. What might have been construed as punishment has become somewhat of a necessity like eating, drinking, sleeping, or all the other sundry things we do to stay alive.

I eat because I’m hungry, though I’m realizing more and more that often I eat and I’m not hungry. I drink because I’m thirsty, though sometimes when I’m thirsty I don’t drink, and sometimes when I’m not thirsty I drink because that’s what you do in certain places (a coffee house, for example). I sleep when I’m tired, though sometimes it is because my wife says it is time to go to bed. The water is muddy, at best.

Kim Mosley

Why do I sit? Up to seven seconds before we make conscious (rational?) decisions we make unconscious decisions. Am I sitting because my unconscious is telling me to slow down and/or wake up?

We hear about cars going from 0–60 mph in a few seconds. Earlier today I was thinking about kids and how fast they are still going at “0.” Kids … no, all of us! We sit down on the couch and have the TV on, a conversation ensuing, a bag of potato chips being consumed, and multitudinous thoughts racing through our heads. That is what we call “laying back, zoning out, vegetating.” Maybe in reality we are going faster than ever. Maybe at 60 mph we are going slower than we are at 0 because we are trying to focus on the situation at hand in order to stay alive.

So what happens if we really slow down and simply focus on our breath? Is this “ground 0?” Is this an opportunity, in stillness, to start to notice that we may not really be hungry, tired, or thirsty? Is this an opportunity, in stillness, to notice that we may not be doing the best for ourselves or others?

Suzuki Roshi said that what is most important is to discover what is most important. I suspect that he knew what this was (to know who he was). It is a life journey. I suspect that it may be facilitated by a little“ quiet wakefulness."

That is why I sit.

About Kim Mosley

Poem (Susan Longenecker)

2011-12-01T22:55:00.007-06:00

Sitting fixes everything.
Sitting makes everything all right   especially me!
Sitting is a breeding ground for compassion and amazement.
Sitting sneaks up on you.
You turn around and find that something has gone
quietly left you when you were not paying attention.
Layers are coming off like the skins of onions
layers and layers of things you don't need
like the bags that go to Goodwill
and are forgotten.
Sitting fills you up with clear water
that has fermented with joy.
Sitting fills you up with hope.

About Susan Longenecker

Peaceful Forest Tim Schorre

A Dashing Kitty Cat (Sharon Meloy)

2011-12-01T22:53:00.007-06:00

A week later I am a week later into learning the wonders of meditating. I am still driving around baffled and delusional. I have not a clue how to quell these racecar thoughts of mine. At this particular moment I am coming home, going right and left through our narrow streets, and I’m in a rather negative, icky state. I’ve settled my mind on work and am having a replay of a conversation that did not go well for me. I am saying all the things I wish I had said, but of course then I would end up going to hell and who wants that. I’m on autopilot driving. Out of nowhere a white cat with orange spots zooms in front of my moving vehicle. Now this stuff happens to all of us, and it’s a big bummer. Especially for someone like me because I LOVE ANIMALS. I once stopped after hitting a frog and could barely look at the poor thing, but I laid it in the grass to die. But here’s the thing about the orange cat. It would have been flattened under my wheel if it had continued on its path to the other side of the street. I’m certain of it. What it does instead is to make a sharp left and continue its fleeing by running straight up the middle of the street, with me now tailing it. This was an uncanny sense of timing on the cat’s part. I had been braking since I saw the first blur of fur. By now, my truck had slowed enough that by trailing behind the cat I gave it the time it needed to once again, exit left and return to the side of the street. I’m sure it’s feline heart was going ninety to nothing. Mine, on the other hand, had soared from the baseline anxieties to the freaking out oh my god I almost hit a cat. Then wondrously I felt my heart rate slipping down to a calming pace, I was so happy and grateful to see the cat win. So next time I’m darting out onto the wrong path I hope to make like a tabby and exit at the right moment, the right time, the right place. Nothing wrong with going back to home plate sometimes and re-thinking things. Meow.

About Sharon Meloy

Sarah Webb

Doan [Zen Bell Ringer] (Kim Mosley)

2011-12-01T22:50:00.008-06:00

H=Her, M=Me

H: So you aren’t perfect. Is that a reason to burn yourself in effigy?

M: No, far from it. But it is a reason to reevaluate my career options.

H: So what do you do as doan (Japanese: 堂行) that is so difficult?

M: I time the sitting and then I ring the bells during the zen service.

H: What can be hard about that?

M: Well, there are two bells … a big one and a small one.

H: Is that for big mind and little mind?

M: You’re learning, but I doubt it, but kind of because the big bell is for the priest and the little bell is for everyone else. And in a sense you could say that the priest might represent big mind just a little more than someone who is not a priest, though I suspect that any priest worth his robe would deny that.

H: What can be hard about hitting a bell?

M: Only two things. Hitting the bell correctly … and … at the right time.

H: Is that all?

M: No. Hitting the bell the same way, time after time. And hitting it so that it makes music, and hitting it so that you aren’t hitting it, but more dancing with it. And not day dreaming.

H: That’s five things.

M: And hitting it in the right patterns.

H: How hard can that be?

M: Well, some people learn quickly. Obviously they were reincarnated from ancient bell ringers.

H: And you?

M: I was reincarnated from … I don’t know. Something that didn’t play the bells. Maybe a monkey or ape. Something that jumped around a lot.

H: Don’t put yourself down. We don’t want any hari kari.

M: Must be my genes that cause the problem. I could blame my age … but I think I’m learning new stuff as slowly as I ever did.

H: How do you know what bell to ring?

M: There is a schedule. But the chant is in Japanese … and I lose my place as quickly as you can say Jack Rabbit.

H: And when do you hit the small bell?

M: At the beginning and end of zazen, to indicate that the sangha should get ready to bow, to indicate that they should bow, to indicate that the chant is coming to the end, to indicate that it really is coming to the end.

H: And what about the big bell?

M: Oh, that indicates that the chant will soon start, that it will start now, that it started, that the priest has bowed to the mat or to the altar.

H: Is that all?

M: Pretty much!

H: Do you know how … but clutch and do it wrong?

M: All the time … well, almost all the time. But that’s perfectly okay … I guess.

About Kim Mosley

A Flying Gecko (Sharon Meloy)

2011-12-01T22:48:00.005-06:00

Sarah Webb

I’m on the patio and I’m watering a fern which is dangling in front of me from the trellis. I’m wondering if I can forfeit my sitting practice for today and just spend time in the garden. Sometimes I think all this sitting in front of a wall is not very productive. Also, I’ve been meditating a WHOLE MONTH and I have more questions than ever before. I want to ask about things, but I feel shy and foolish. Like, is it okay to sit and just blissfully daydream for 30 minutes, or should I try and re-focus every nanosecond my mind wanders? And why do I feel more anxiety now than when I started my practice? But back to the fern. I’m staring into all the greenery when I suddenly realize I’m staring into two little shiny round eyes. The little gecko is looking right at me from a distance of only about a foot. He is as Irish green as a color changing lizard sitting in a lush green fern would be. His head tilts to one side, then the other. He is really checking me out. I talk sweetly to him and am getting a kick out of watching his funny little head dance, when, out of the blue, he jumps. Right across the abyss between the fern and me. He has landed on my shoulder and I have yelped in surprise. Then he runs off down the flagstone and away. Hmmm. What in the world was he thinking, jumping over to me like that? Did he just need a quick route down to the ground? It seemed like a friendly gesture actually, like he wanted to reach out to me somehow. Maybe he was trying to tell me, “go ahead and ask your questions, reach out and take a leap of faith.” Okay, I know this is an anthropomorphic stretch of the imagination, but heh, I’m such a novice here that I need these anecdotes to help me along. So I’ll take the visual of flying geckos and use it next time I hesitate to raise my hand in curiosity. I’ll try the leap of faith trick.

About Sharon Meloy

Herb Cain (with reaction by Jamie MacLaggan)

2011-12-01T22:45:00.006-06:00

Far beyond enjoying, sitting plugs one in to the “dial tone of the universe.”—Herb Cain, circa 1968

[what's a dial tone]

[one ringy dingy]

About Jamie MacLaggan

A Horse Lesson (Sharon Meloy)

2011-12-01T22:39:00.006-06:00

Sarah Webb

About a year ago I volunteered to work with kids who rode therapy horses. My job was to simply lead the horse around the ring while the child sat in the saddle. Now, I’m a good dog handler. I trained all the dogs in our family, entered little shows, taught them search and rescue stuff. I don’t know beans about horses, but I figured my knack with animals would make this horse naturally do exactly what I wanted. I found out this was wrong figuring. I tried to lead a horse around a ring that refused to be led around a ring. This went on for months, and my frustration level was pretty high. Everyone kept saying, “Don’t look at the horse. Just walk with confidence and the horse will follow.” Or, “Don’t pull on the reins, just hold them and lead.” They even gave me a stable full of different ponies, but they all reacted the same way. They just didn’t like me. Now, I gotta tell ya, I was heartbroken. Horses don’t like me? But I love horses! I just couldn’t accept the realization that I was out of my league. I wanted to be the horse whisperer therapy chick. It just wasn’t meant to be. It is what it is. Just like this morning’s dharma talk. Acceptance. It is what it is. One more time. Acceptance. It is what it is. At least I’ve got good horse sense.

About Sharon Meloy

Noisely (Kim Mosley)

2011-12-01T22:38:00.006-06:00

About Kim Mosley

Road Trip (Glen Snyder)

2011-12-01T22:35:00.006-06:00

I first learned how to sit zazen in the back seat of a 1959 Chevy Bellaire in the summer of 1964 while crossing America. It was sky-blue, with tail fins and chrome trim just like the one on the back cover of “Coney Island of the Mind” but without the spraypaint. It was on a journey that took us from Michigan through the Corn Belt and the Prairielands then winding through the desert Wastelands of the American West until we finally arrived at the Pacific coast.

Somewhere along the highway that cuts through oblivion, an identical Chevy Bellaire emerges from a distant billowing dust cloud. Its car horn wails: wwwwwhhhhaaaAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHhhhhoooooowwwwwwwwww
as it speeds by, careening back and forth with eastcoast-bound Jack at the wheel, and Albert up front, and Phil sitting full lotus in the back seat and everyone laughing and joking about every haiku they had made up thus far throughout this entire great journey: about the cactuses and the windmills, about the crows and the corn silos, about small Midwestern towns, skinny dogs and fruit stands, and about the myriad other things, both animate and inanimate, that have arisen and blown away behind them somewhere.

Or maybe all of that happened in some parallel universe of the vehicular realm. I don’t know. I was just five at the time and if I was looking out the car window with my eyes wide open it was just to see if there were cowboys and Indians yet. My backseat companion was my sister Cher who was only two, so she doesn’t remember any of it. All I know for sure about happenings going on in the rest of the world was that Kennedy was definitely dead. When that happened, I was on the swingsets behind the apartments and Mom came out crying that they had shot the President and then we saw LBJ get sworn in on our black-and-white in the basement. We sat right in front of the TV for that. This was different because usually I hid behind the laundry hamper with my plastic cap gun so that when stuff got out of hand on Gunsmoke I’d be able to dodge the bullets. When Kennedy died I didn’t squint my eyes at all, but when things got too scary on Gunsmoke, I would squint my eyes almost completely closed so that I could barely see through my eyelashes and that way the people on the TV could barely see me either. That was my way of being invisible. Usually Mom would look up from her ironing or whatever she was doing and say, $#8220;Why are you making that face again?” The day before the trip, Mom gave me a dime and I went to the truck on the corner with my next-door girlfriend Michelle to get a two-stick fudge-sickle and we split it and both our moms tried to explain that we wouldn’t be seeing each other for a long long time.

All of this was after a Saturday leading up to the road trip, when I had been in the front seat with Dad and we went to a gas station and then we went to do errands. As Dad would later say, it was the fault of the gas station attendant who must have not latched the hood after checking the oil. So that when we got back on the highway, a gust of wind snapped back the hood, cracking the front windshield and blocking our view of the road. Dad slammed on the breaks and the hood slammed back down. It was before seatbelts and so I flew forward and smacked my head on the metal dash. I must have fallen on the mat below the glove compartment after that. Dad went out to put down the hood and probably to cuss because back then it was a bad thing to cuss in front of kids. He came back in and said, “Are you okay?” “I’m okay,” I replied, crying a bit. We went home and got ice for the bump on my head. Then we went to a junkyard. There were lots of wrecked cars piled up and next to each other. After some walking, we found a blue Chevy Bellaire just like ours but with the door on the driver’s side all bashed in. There was some dried blood on the car seat. The junkyard man came and marked on the windshield. Then another one came and they took the windshield out of the wrecked car. They glued the windshield into our car and our car was as good as new.

Early before sunrise, Dad packed Cher and me into the Chevy like half-awake luggage. There was a small U-Haul hitched to the back that I secretly watched through barely-open eye, squinting secretly to watch as I pretended that I was invisible. We rolled out of Midland, Michigan, passing by the glowing lights and smokestacks of Dow Chemical Company and then past miles and miles of cornfields shrouded in darkness and we didn’t turn back. We were off for the Rancho Palos Verdes where my Dad and the rest of us had been transferred so that California and the rest of the world would become better places with more plastics and pesticides and napalm and so-forth. But that is another story. After about 4 hours of this journey, it was light out and Cher was carsick, crying and throwing up, and I quickly exhausted all of the games of counting license plates, cows, roadsigns and roadkill until I finally just leaned out the open window enough to watch the highway lines whip by until I felt like barfing also.

I’m not sure if we had any money back then, or if it was just one of my Dad‣s lessons in frugality, but in any case, to save money on hotels, Dad, being a chemical engineer and such, cut a sheet of plywood to fit in the back seat with two two-by-four legs on door-hinges to support it so that there was a flat surface running all the way from the crack in the back seat to the back of the front seat. Then he cut a sheet of 3-inch foam rubber to fit the whole thing and wrapped it in bed-sheets. It was a good idea in principle, he just didn’t account for the fact that the trip was a week long and the port-a-bed that he had fashioned had no place where we could put our feet down. So, Mom and Dad took turns driving and sleeping in front. In the back, Cher and I had to either lie down or sit cross-legged the whole way. And I couldn’t lie down without being on her half of the seat and she couldn’t lie down without being on my half of the seat. I kept whining that Cher was touching me with her foot until Dad, not even slowing the car, just reached back with his right hand and whacked me hard. After that there was just a lot of sitting involved. The car was hot ’ the closest thing to air conditioning was that little triangular window in the front door that would create a wind current when opened. After a couple of days Cher had a fever and would sit in Mom’s lap up front while Mom would wipe her face with a damp washcloth.

We ate sack lunches for the first couple of days, and Mom and Dad would take turns driving. They were kept in a Styrofoam cooler with ice in the front seat underneath Mom’s legs. The sack lunches consisted of butter and strawberry jam sandwiches which were somewhat soggy-red from the jam and kind of wadded up from being in the grocery bag for so long. There were also carrot sticks which tasted a bit like earth and a bit like wood. Also, there were Fig Newtons which were slightly bent and crumbly which were the only thing sweet we had, because Dad didn’t allow us to eat sugar because sugar rots your teeth out, but somehow Fig Newtons were okay in his book. And finally all of that food ran out, and I was jumping up and down happy when we pulled into a real McDonalds, arches and all. I ordered a hamburger there along with french-fries and a milkshake. Dad asked for an extra paper cup, guzzled off the top part of my shake then poured half of the remainder into the extra cup for my sister. Next he ripped my hamburger in half and gave half of the squashed bun and ketchup-and-mustard-bleeding-burger to Mom to help Cher eat. Mom and Dad got their own burgers but I didn’t say anything about my burger. I was just grateful, I think, that I got all of the pickle slice. I do remember thinking, though, that my vanilla shake would have tasted better if it didn’t have Dad’s saliva in it.

Once we reached a railroad crossing where the big wooden arms painted like candy canes came down between our car and the passing freight train. I counted the cars as high as I could count, and finally waved to the engineer who waved back from the yellow caboose. After that, there was some kind of malfunction that made the red lights stay on and the arms stay down. Soon there were many cars lined up behind ours. Cher sat in Mom’s lap as the car got hotter and hotter. I sat in the back seat and we waited for the crossing arms to move for multiple five-year-old-kalpas of time. I’ve learned subsequently that sometimes families in similar situations do strange things like sing Broadway Musicals, play word games, share riddles and such. Not us. When the car was moving, Mom might say something like, “sit still and be very quiet, your Dad is busy driving.” But, in this case, we weren’t moving at all. We just sat there with our mouths closed, breathing hot summer asphalt-air through our nostrils. Suddenly the gate started going ding-ding-ding. It raised up, clearing our way. We continued on in tired silence.

The great promise that Mom made to me was that after a few days we would be in the desert and would be able to see cactuses with arms on them, and tumbleweeds, and real cowboys and Indians. At one point I thought that if I was really lucky, the Indians would block the road with their horses, and after a brief shootout, they would snatch me from out of the car window, and carry me off on horseback to their camp where they would raise me on beef jerky and fishheads and other food left over from feeding their pet coyotes. Unfortunately, things didn’t go that well. There were some little cactuses and blue sky and lots of dust and it was mostly just really boring.

Inevitably our trusty Chevy Bellaire started to overheat from towing the U-Haul across the desert. So my Dad pulled off at a gas station. I got out of the car with him, standing by as he opened the hood of the car and found a red oily rag for removing the cap from the radiator. Somehow I too was equipped with a rag in my hand to help out. As he turned the cap, a blast of steam and blackened water sprayed out. I was hit with the scalding steam in my eyes and on my face. Things went blurry, and I remember Dad, being trained in industrial accidents and such, calmly and resolutely grabbed me, wiped my stinging face with his oily rag, grabbed a hose and held my head down to run cold water over my eyes. “Are you okay,” he said. “Yeah,” I whimpered. Once back inside the car, Mom found me a clean tee-shirt and wrapped a wet towel around my head. She gave me a few half-melted ice cubes from the cooler to hold on my face. We continued down the road. After several hours I took the towel off. Things were okay, kind of.

On the final day of our trip we got out of the car at a rest stop. It was a barren place in the middle of nowhere and I was standing by a barbed-wire fence waiting while Mom changed Cher’s diapers, when I realized there was a giant bird staring at me. I called Dad who looked at it and told me it was a peacock that must have gotten loose from a peacock farm. It looked kind of gray and scraggly, with no tail feathers left to speak of. Mom and Dad chased it down and put it in a pillow case. For the final afternoon and evening of our journey, I rode sitting cross-legged with a peacock in a pillowcase in my lap. It was really too big for the pillow case, so I kept the pillowcase over its head. Mom said to hold it that way so that it would think that it was night time. Every once and awhile it would move around and peck at my hand through the pillowcase. I was thinking that perhaps around the next turn, we would come to a sudden stop with Marshal Dillon aiming his rifle straight at me. “Get out of that car with your hands up,” he would shout, mounted on his horse squarely planted in the middle of the road. I would then be arrested, hog-tied, and lashed to a saddle, to be carried off to one of those wild-west jails for the crime of peacock-rustling. This would not be the last time in my childhood that I would worry about getting arrested for something Dad had just done.

It was dark, and late at night, when we got to our new house in Rancho Palos Verdes. The movers had already arrived, and there were boxes everywhere. We let the peacock out on the porch and slept on mattresses on the floor. On our first morning in California, we ate cereal for breakfast. A high-school-age boy from next door came to our house and said hello. He wanted to know if the noisy peacock on their rooftop that woke them up at sunrise might belong to us. After that Dad went off to work. Cher slept in her bed. My bed wasn’t set up yet but I had a room and this was California now and I just sat on my mattress in my room and the mattress still moved gently beneath me like there were wheels underneath rolling over a long highway.

Somewhere along the highway that cuts through oblivion, an identical Chevy Bellaire emerges from a distant billowing dust cloud.
“Phil. Hey,Phil. Wake up,” Albert says, leaning back from the front passenger seat.
“What?...What time is it? What is this? Ohh, looks like Ohio or something” says Phil, yawning.
“Look, up in front of us,” says Albert.
“What are the chances,” says Jack as he hits the gas. “Not even in a million kotis of kalpas.”
As the car accelerates, he suddenly lays on the horn:
WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!
The twin Chevy Bellaires rocket towards each other on the empty highway. For an instant panicked faces glance through tempered glass windows, and then suddenly they are no longer driving towards each other but are driving in opposite directions, and they are growing smaller and smaller to each other until each car is no longer perceptible to the other.
“Why’d you do that?” Albert says.
“Sorry, just got kind of carried away. Thought maybe it was us in that car and if I got our attention, we would look up and see that it was us and then we would see ourselves as we are.”
“It wasn’t us, though,” says Phil. “You see that kid hanging out the window. You scared him to death.”
“Nahh,” says Albert. “I saw his face. Hardly noticed. His mind was somewhere else.”
“We are all someplace else in our minds,” says Jack behind the wheel. “ If we were really awake we would see that our present abiding place is right here in this golden sublime realm of cornfield garlands: our vehicle, the adamintine Chevrolet Bellaire color of lapis lazuli, that has transported us all this way moving on the wings of four hundred garudas through all the six realms and ten directions, its chrome trim and majestic tail fins have cut through delusion like thunderbolt vajras, its wheels and hubcaps are the true wheels of dharma, continually spinning and yet instantaneously motionless, the very wind that blows off the very Mount Meru wafts in though its rolled-down windows, its engine hums the song of retinues of lute-strumming gandharvas vocalizing the songs of as many universes as there are grains of corn pollen blowing about in this Midwestern moment of crisp morning air. ”
“Please, I need a coffee,” says Phil. “Let’s stop somewhere. And I can drive a bit, after that.”

About Glen Snyder

The Sidewalk Dog (Sharon Mcloy)

2011-12-01T22:34:00.005-06:00

Sarah Webb

I like to walk the hood. I like it a lot. I try to walk fast to get the benefit of exercise, but a lot of time I end up lollygagging. I live in a cool old West Austin neighborhood with an eclectic mix of architecture and personality. But today I’m walking at a real stride and my thoughts are flying like kites in the wind. Easy breezy. It’s really very nice to have a mind that behaves well. Wish I could bottle that formula. Oh that’s right, the Buddha already did. Anyway, I have the sidewalk all to myself until BAM I walk smack dab into a sweet yellow lab sunning himself out in front of his house. I’ve seen him before, a bit of an elderly four legger, yet aaaalllllll lab. He scoots up into a stance and, I swear, we have a normal conversation about what a nice day it is and, yes, my mind is beautifully vacant right now too. I pet him and he wags his tail and I’m on my way. It makes me think about what life was like before you had words to describe things. You were just a baby babbling. You just had visuals and feelings and a sense of something. Next time I meditate I’ll try not to name anything, to forget I know language. I’ll be like a yellow lab and just be.

About Sharon Meloy

Waiting to Sit (Kim Mosley)

2011-12-01T22:32:00.007-06:00

It struck me funny all the things "sitting" enthusiasts do to sit … like rushing somewhere to sit (a contradiction?). Or better yet, to arrive early and then to wait to sit … where waiting is a skill that the Buddha acquired.

About Kim Mosley

Awareness Practice (Rev. Joseph W. Hall)

2011-12-01T22:30:00.006-06:00

Bodhisattvas,

In zazen, we seek to become develop our sense of awareness of the world around us, to open our senses to every detail, and to discover the hidden impact of our slightest actions. We do this by sitting in front of a wall and staring at it. Sometimes this works, of course, and the boundaries between ourselves and the room seem not so hard anymore. Sounds drift in from outside, and we allow them to intermingle and intertwine with our mind as they pass. As the practice period continues, this deepening awareness allows us to see, on the large scale, our connection to the earth and our role in global warming. On a smaller scale, as attendance has grown over the last several months, our practice has also deepened our ability to hear every #*%& sound in the zendo.

Since we are a lay sangha and highly mobile people in a complex world, we face the particular challenge of having to constantly shift gears, most importantly to downshift when approaching the quiet zone that is AZC.

Here's a few ideas about that. You don't have to do this but it might make practice more engaging …

The next time the ending bell rings, make a special note of what you have done, the way you can hear things now that you didn't notice 35 minutes ago. Marvel a bit at how even silence itself has a texture. Please find a sense of wonder here, because you will need this later. Then, the next time you return to zendo, keep this in mind as you approach the zazen zone. If you haven't already, shift into Zen mode before the car door slams shut. As you approach the front door, be aware that if there is no wind blowing or AC running, the people seated on the Zafus inside will hear your conversation on the porch more clearly than you can. As you reach for the doorknob, bear in mind that whatever way you open the door will be part of someone's meditation. You are not just entering a building—you are creating a sacred space and we are all connected now.

(On a personal note, the Ino smiles inwardly when he hears the soft click of the door latch. It means that if you came in late, he will not have to get up and close the door when the breeze blows it open.)

About Peaceful Forest Tim Schorre

Can you set your shoes down without making a sound today? Try that and then walk like an Indian—instead of striking the floor with your heels and telegraphing your arrival, allow the ball of your foot to find the floor first and step quietly into the Zendo.

As you pass through the arch, remember that you are stepping into other people's minds. Every sound you make is part of zazen now. Walk quietly and very slowly in the zendo. Perhaps it a little distracting to worry so much about disturbing others and this is definitely a little stressful and definitely no fun at all. So don't worry about that. We're buddists, so intentions are the thing that counts. You are fearless. You are stalking the dharma. Approach your Zafa, and your true nature, just like you would any other wild animal. Try not to make sudden movements. You don't want to scare it off and have to chase it through the brush of your mind.

As you settle into zazen, remember this, the methods of being silent only go so far. The best way to reach quiet is simply to listen, as intimately as you possibly can.

Do this and you've really arrived at your cushion in true form. But there is one more final thing and it happens as the next person arrives and, despite all your hard work, slams the door front door, tromps across the floor, and decides to sit (and breathe in a very erratic manner) right next to you. This is exactly the moment to remember that the sacred space we make was never about being silent, it was about being real. This is the only real way to learn what happens when we don't like something—how our irritation immediately gets involved and amplifies whatever sound we don't like. It turns out that our mind makes most of the noise anyway. We are an urban sangha sitting amidst the sound of planes, trains, automobiles, and whatever kind of day people bring in the door. Suddenly one sound that we don't like drowns out an entire city. This is the time to remember that silence always surrounds us, it is the white space that allows us to separate the noise into a kaleidoscope of small sounds. Have we yet heard the sound, or are we still just hearing how our reaction reverberates?

About Betty Gross

A Japanese zen teacher once said that zen mind is being able to let the eye wander a tree with one red leaf on it and not get stopped by the one that seems different. Big Mind, in his words, is to learn to see all the leaves, all the time. So the best response is to continue your quiet practice and demonstrate the value of it for the benefit of others. Keep trying to hear the white space, to find silence in noise. If that fails, ask the Ino to send out a note. He does this from time to time.

Perhaps this might be useful to remember ...
1. Everything is connected.
2. The connections clank, vibrate, and thud and otherwise make a surprising amount of noise.
3. You have the power to create beauty in the minds of others.
4. In the zen world, the ability to travel the connections in silence is considered a sign of virtuosity.
5. We are learning this together.

See you on the mat.

A Bow,
Joe

About Rev. Joseph W. Hall

Contributors to this Issue

2011-12-01T12:15:00.007-06:00

Betty Gross studied Yoga in India, France, and Greece and has taught yoga for fourteen years in Austin. Her Buddhist study started with Chogam Trunpa Rimpoche, and she has studied Buddhism in Nepal and Tibet. She has been a member of AZC for many years.

Rev. Joseph W. Hall is a resident priest at the Austin Zen Center. He attends Shogaku Zen Seminary as part of the Shogaku Priest Ongoing Training program. His energy is enthusiastically focused on the nexus between Lay Practice and the Monastic world, and he is fascinated the ways in which we interpret the world and the means by which physical motion trains the mind. He blogs at rawzen.org .

Xianyang Carl Jerome studied under Zenshin Philip Whalen Roshi at the Hartford Street Zen Center in San Francisco and is now a student of Master Ji Ru of the Mid-America Buddhist Association in Chicago. He teaches at the North Shore Meditation and Dharma Center in Highland Park, IL. He is a friend of Kim Mosley.

Susan Longenecker says, “I've lived in Austin since about 1993; worked in Florida before that as a marine biologist … I've been married about 15 years, been coming to the Zen Center for six years … have no children … my hobbies are painting and reading and I plan to take up taiko drumming … and I'm involved in the prison outreach program with the Zen Center … ”

Jamie MacLaggan writes “My true path started in 1975, San Francisco Bay area, when I read Frithjof Capra’s Tao Of Physics, and was led to Mu Soeng Sunim’s Heart Sutra: Ancient Buddhist Wisdom in the Light of Quantum Reality. With these tools, it was a short step to Suzuki Roshi’s Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind and I began to sit as he instructed; of course, that was the most powerful tool in the kit! I continued to sit when I moved to Austin in 1978. I have lived in the same house with the same spouse for 28 years, raised a family—I’m a grandpa—and I’m still awed by the whole dance … ”

Sharon Meloy says, I started going to AZC last spring after moving here from Colorado. I'm a cardiac nurse but was once a professional photographer and I'm starting to get back my creative energy. I've never written anything for other people to read. I think coming to the zendo has given me a newfound freedom of expression without having to judge myself. I really love the community spirit of AZC!

Kim Mosley, a co-editor of Just This, was born in Chicago in 1946. He taught at School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Bradley University, Southern Methodist University, Lindenwood University and St. Louis Community College (where he was also Dean of Liberal Arts). His work is in collections including the Art Institute of Chicago, the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, and the Center for Creative Photography in Tucson. His blog, Diaristic Notations, has over 1300 posts of writing and art.

Peaceful Forest Tim Schorre is a student of Setsuan Gaelyn Godwin and serves as Tanto at Houston Zen Center. He also practices architecture as a partner in Morningside Architects in Houston and practices drawing a lot, as well as photography and video. His visual work may be seen at timothyschorre.com .

Glen Snyder grew up in Washington state and in Michigan. He lived in Costa Rica for 14 years, first as a Peace Corps volunteer, then as a high school teacher. At present, he lives in Houston and works at Rice University as a geochemist. His research travels have taken him to many places, including Japan, Chile, Nicaragua, El Salvador, New Zealand, China, and Antarctica. Zen Practitioner and student of Setsuan Gaelyn Godwin, he is currently the Ino at the Houston Zen Center. Glen’s work page is: http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~gsnyder/

Elizabeth Stein is a member of the Houston Zen Center. Her short screenplay, Leaving Death Row, will be published in 2012 in a collection, Demands of the Dead, by the University of Iowa Press.

Sarah Webb, a co-editor for Just This, is an English professor retired from the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma, where she is the editor of poetry and fiction for the interdisciplinary magazine Crosstimbers. Her teacher is Albert Low of the Montreal Zen Centre. She spends her winters tutoring ESL and writing and her summers traveling the West in her VW bus.

Introduction I: Walking as Practice (Kim Mosley and Sarah Webb)

2011-06-01T11:52:00.005-05:00

S: Is walking part of your practice?

K: I’m doan, so Saturday is when I do kinhin. But I also walk every morning with my neighbor. My father said you should never have a walking partner because that ties you down. But he must have done his way of contemplation when he walked. He walked maybe 3 hours a day.

S: Wow! That’s a lot.

K: He would meet people he knew and he would talk to them, and then he would continue with his walking. It was a private thing for him. Even though he walked in a little town, on the coast.

S: In sesshins when I had problems with my back, my teacher would have me go out and walk on a walkway. He said it’s not to be looking at the flowers, just be aware of your walking. It was a pretty rapid pace and the walkway was real rough, so you had to be careful or you’d end up with a splinter in your toe. That consolidated walking in me. Sometimes when I’m walking, I feel like I’m going to the same place as when I was walking in the garden up there.

That kind of walking, it’s not, now my heel is doing this and my arch is doing this and the ball of my foot is doing this, it’s not that kind of close concentration, but it’s being present when I walk.

K: This last weekend I was doing a sesshin with some prisoners in Bastrop, and I told them Reb Anderson’s comment about walking, “You should walk on the earth as if it were your mother’s face.” Then I looked at them and I said, “That’s assuming you like your mother.”

When we started walking, there was a Christian class next door and the guy was telling how everything you needed to know about life was in the Bible, and you could hear every word he was saying. I wanted them to be able to concentrate more on their walking, so I told them that they should create a mantra for each step. I said that for the left foot it could be “Now I step on the earth.” And for the right it could be “Now I step on the sky.” Now I step on the earth. Now I step on the sky. I tried that a couple of hours ago on the sidewalk, and I noticed that the sky step was a lot lighter than the earth step.

About Kim Mosley | Sarah Webb

Please enjoy your walking... (Edward Espe Brown)

2011-06-01T11:40:00.006-05:00

Please enjoy your walking,
the sensations, your breath,
the fresh air—step by step—
"Inhaling … calm … body
Exhaling … joyful … smile"
Having a slight smile for
someone who is angry,
someone who is scared,
someone who can't smile.
Blessings,
Edward

About Edward Espe Brown

Stepping into Now (Krishna Bhattacharyya)

2011-06-01T11:38:00.005-05:00

Naked foot on flat, smooth misshapen rock
That is, rock with thin green moss-layer
One slowly, carefully down, then another

That’s cool

Heel mashes onto miniscule caviar-like orbs, green
Carefully, quietly, moving undetected
Soon there are hundreds of rocks, pebbles
Foot comes down toes first, then arch, then body, lastly, heel
Onto smooth, rough, sharp, varied textures
Reflexology at its natural best
Poking here, prodding or pushing there, sometimes giving way
Semi-soft leaves

A slight relief

Proud
Brown flakes compact ‘neath the weight
Gravity the helper
Some
Places wet, others, dry

Here, a sun-drenched spot
Nothing wrong with brown warmth

Somewhat comforting
Here a shadow, there a shadow
Today I prefer the sun
There, the bell is rung
Another sitting has begun

k.b. 3/31/07 Mindfulness Day Retreat-UU

About Krishna Bhattacharyya

Homage to Sosan (Xianyang Carl Jerome)

2011-06-01T11:37:00.003-05:00

Walking
meditation
is
much
better
than
sitting
meditation
at
showing
me
my
preferences.
And
The
Great
Way
is
of
course
the
Way
with-
out
preferences.
Which is
why
I
so
love
and
hate
walking
meditation.

About Xianyang Carl Jerome

Stepping Off (Pat Yingst)

2011-06-01T11:36:00.003-05:00

I have always loved our slow kinhin walking. But it took on a new meaning for me several years ago when my Rinzai teacher gave me the koan “How do you take the next step off a 100-foot pole?” I found our Kinhin practice to be very helpful in my working on this koan. Each step taken in concert with the outbreath and with a temporary dissolving of thought became, in my mind, a step off the pole. Sometime I could even imagine the void beneath my lifted foot.

In one way of looking at it, each step is a step into the future—the great unknown. I protect myself from facing this great scary unknown by presuming to know it; I dream that my routine, my plans, my expectations are all true and immutable and that I will get in my car after zazen and proceed to my job or whatever activity I have designed for myself. And nearly all the time my prediction comes true. And so it continues—one predictable day to the next. How safe I am!

I protect myself from fear of the unknown—from jumping off that pole. But If I could drop all this KNOWING what is going to happen next— then I really would be stepping off the pole with every step and with every breath. I might still go to my job after zazen, but there would be freshness and gratitude in the experiencing of it. How exhilarating!

About Pat Yingst

Our Buddha Walked Away (Nancy Webber)

2011-06-01T11:35:00.003-05:00

About Nancy Webber

Introduction II: Walking the Path (Kim Mosley and Sarah Webb)

2011-06-01T11:34:00.007-05:00

S: There’s something about walking that connects to the earth. You’re not so much up in your head. You’re down in your feet. You’re down on the pathway. You’re getting connected to your body and your passage through whatever you’re walking with, or you’re walking on.

K: I love the idea that we’re feeling the earth. When my daughter got married this last weekend, the judge who did the service asked me, who supports this marriage? I thought, it wasn’t just people—it was everything. In the same way we can walk on the earth as if we are the most important thing and the earth is just this receptacle, or we can walk as equal partner, or we can walk as if the earth is the most important thing, kind of like a Chinese landscape painting and we’re just getting a favor from it for a short time

S: Like a blessing or a gift.

K: Yeah.

S: Something that struck me when you were talking about the wedding is that walking is part of the ceremony. People walk down the aisle. They walk out of the church. Walking is a sacred element of the marriage ceremony. Also there have been times when people circumambulate something that’s sacred. Walking—it’s not just in Zen—but walking is a sacred act.

Part of it is taking walking on and making it sacred. You take your breath on when you sit. There’s these basic things you do. Like you eat, and that can be communion or it can be mindful when you eat. And you walk. And you breathe. For me, opening a door, putting my hand on a door knob, is sacred and I often come to myself when I do that because I associate that with walking in the door for dokusan. So you’ve taken an ordinary basic part of your being that you do a hundred thousand times and you make it sacred.

K: It’s one of the things we do that we’ve probably done from our beginning.
S: Yeah.
K: A lot of things we do, like talking into a tape recorder, are not things we have done from the beginning. In another era we would have either remembered what we said or someone would remember it.

S: Not only in the beginning like walking out of Africa and coming through the rest of the continents, but also from the beginning as people. When a kid stands up and takes that first step, they’re becoming a person.
K: I remember when my son was taking his first steps and I was on the phone with my parents, and I said, “he’s done one step! he’s done two steps! he’s done three steps!” And I think we got up to five.

About Kim Mosley | Sarah Webb

Makena and Jasper

2011-06-01T11:33:00.002-05:00

Every Moment (Kathy Goodwin)

2011-06-01T11:32:00.004-05:00

Every moment of every day, every person we meet, is an opportunity to walk the path. How do I remember to remember this?

About Kathy Goodwin

Three Blind Men (Kim Mosley)

2011-06-01T11:31:00.003-05:00

I drove by three blind
men walking down the
street. One had a white
cane. They held onto each
other 4 dear life.

About Kim Mosley

Gardening (Ronnie Gaubatz)

2011-06-01T11:28:00.004-05:00

I spent some quality time in my garden this morning. My garden is not so much a place to do, but a place to think. I thought about the flowers as I prune them back, trimming off the dead ones so new buds might bloom. It seems a shame to cut off a flower just after it blooms. With a good dose of guilt, I added some weed killer to my soil. I seriously dislike the idea of a weed killer, but I truly hate weeds. I offered my apologies to the environment. Yesterday, I added some cancer killer, round three hundred it seems of chemotherapy, to my body. I hate cancer even more than I hate weeds.

As I water the flowers, I think of the trail of tears that seem to be following me lately. I am blessed with a number of concerned friends who cry for me since this latest season of cancer in bloom. If only tears shed could bring new life the way this garden hose will do for my plants. I both comfort and take comfort in my worried friends. I tell them it’s okay. I remind myself that we are all going through this together. I assure them, and myself, that I’ll fight this time just like I did all the other times before. This is my path, mine and everyone on it with me, my friends, my family, my dear children. I’ll walk it with dignity, courage and hope.

The morning pours on and I weed, I water, I weep and I worry. I pray for strength. I pray for my girls. I give thanks for flowers and friends that cry. After a while, thoughts of errands to run and what’s for dinner interrupt me, and I gather up the cold coffee I forgot to drink when I came down here and the gardening tools and head on up the yard to the rest of the things I’d like to do today. I leave all the sad and sometimes scary thoughts back there in the garden, lying in the warm soil next to the spent buds I had cut back -all of it, just compost.

This is my beautiful path.

May 20, 2011

About Ronnie Gaubatz

Active Thought (Robert Genn)

2011-06-01T11:18:00.008-05:00

The mentally challenging nature of artistic activity may help avoid the inconvenience of early senility. I don't know about you, but a steady diet of crossword puzzles to tune up the mind just doesn't cut it for me. I've got enough mind-benders with my painting.

On the other hand, there's the sedentary nature of our business. Long hours sitting at an easel can be as dangerous as computer work or couch TV. Recent studies by James Levine, a medical researcher at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, have surprised and shocked the conventional wisdom. Specifically aimed at understanding the sources of obesity, sensors placed on the bodies of a wide range of folks with similar diets found that those who moved around more and, most important, stood a lot, tended to stay trim and fit. Levine figures we have to stop thinking of food as the source of fatness and begin to understand that it's inertia that does us in.

People who move around, even nervously, and stand rather than sit, also reap creative benefits. According to Levine, even really bad habits can be somewhat neutralized by sheer movement.

There's quite a bit of evidence that Levine may be on to something. Take Winston Churchill. He smoked cigars and drank every day until his death at age 90. "Smoke good cigars and drink fine brandy," he advised. Churchill wrote 77 books (he won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1953), most of them simply dictated while standing or pacing in a cloud of smoke before a lectern in his office. Physical movement was part of his creative process.

While most of the photos of Churchill painting show him sitting, he often stood at his easel. His active bricklaying and gardening are well known.

I recently heard of a workshop instructor who gets his students to lay down a tape on the floor six or eight feet from the canvas. He encourages students to stand behind the line and lunge forward to make strokes, then immediately get back to survey the situation. In an attempt to make myself into a better person, I've been lunging for the last couple of weeks. So far I'm happy with the results, but I'm a bit puffed out. Then again, friends gave me a few cigars for my birthday. And brandy.

Best regards,

Robert

PS: "Sitting still is highly dangerous." (James A. Levine)

Esoterica: It's somewhat the same effect you get when you go for a walk. The heartbeat goes up even if you're only pacing back and forth. You may also be burning a few calories (sitting--your calorie burn goes down to one calorie per minute), but the main thing is that the subconscious brain is prodded into a relaxed mode where ideas bubble and confidence rises. Here's a simple test to prove the worth of Churchill's method: Try dictating long, compound, grammatically correct sentences while pacing around and also while lounging on the sofa. Believe me, standing up or pacing wins out every time. That's how this letter was written.

May 20. 2011

See also: More on Walking by Robert Genn in his twice weekly emails (with information on a free subscription).

About Robert Genn

Too Sad for ART (Kim Mosley)

2011-06-01T11:16:00.003-05:00

About Kim Mosley

Kintaro Walks Japan (Tyler MacNiven w/commentary by Sarah Webb)

2011-06-01T11:15:00.003-05:00

Kintaro Walks Japan tells the video-story of Tyler MacNiven’s 2000-mile hike through Japan. Tyler walks Japan from tip to tip, staying with families who offer him a bed, or camping. His 5-month journey is part adventure and coming of age, part exploration of the country of the Ayumi, the girl he has come to love. His prospective father-in-law had made a walking trip in the Americas (the length of the Americas, 19,000 miles!) and served as an inspiration. (His story is told in George Meegan, The Longest Walk).

Expressive and more than a bit of a clown, Tyler becomes a minor media celebrity. He visits schools and old folks homes, and stays with Japanese families he meets. He says, “I didn’t want to just visit Japan; I wanted to become part of Japan.” Because of his open-heartedness, he does seem to come part of the lives of the people he met. As Tyler says, “If you give yourself to the journey, your journey gives itself to you.” Tyler seems to find it easy to open to another culture and to new experiences. He describes an early encounter with friends on the road: “I had never tasted beer, even in college, but I figured since this was my spiritual quest I had better say yes to everything.”

The physical demands of travel are more challenging. At times the prospect of a thousand-something miles ahead is daunting. At four months in, in a period of deep fatigue, he explains why he hasn’t been taking days to rest from walking: “I was afraid if I stopped, I wouldn’t be able to take it up again.” He has to persevere through his exhaustion.

Tyler says of the process of walking, “It’s healthy, it’s natural, and it can’t be rushed. If you’re walking at 3 miles per hour, it really gives you time to interact with what’s happening around you. If you’re driving you can just speed by everything without really taking it in. But walking, you can see every turn, you can look at the trees, watch the clouds, feel the winds, see the insects, smell every smell. And, my favorite, you can interact with the people.”

Kintaro’s journey shows how walking can help us open to the richness of what is right in front of us.

About Tyler MacNiven

Glory ... Amen ... Glory ... (Annie Dillard)

2011-06-01T11:00:00.003-05:00

“...my left foot says 'Glory,' and my right foot says 'Amen!’” —Annie Dillard from A Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

About Annie Dillard

Float (Kim Mosley)

2011-06-01T10:59:00.002-05:00

Andy Warhol stopped

walking and used a

wheelchair. After many

days up & down stairs

I'm going to do some-

thing extreme like just

float yogi-style. Start-

ing tomorrow—maybe.

Float away

No more stair-

s!!!

About Kim Mosley

Encouraging Words from Tassajara (Kosho McCall)

2011-06-01T10:52:00.002-05:00

Stay as present as you can. Each time you see you’ve strayed from the present, rejoice! It is prajna that sees this so what you ordinarily might have called a failure and berated yourself is actually a victory. Clear seeing of what’s happening is wisdom—each coming back is compassion.

We are here to drop away body and mind To drop away body and mind we have to employ body and mind ardently and with great effort. There is no control in this effort. Control only leads to suffering. There is only willingness, a willingness to meet each moment with a fresh, open mind and a forgiving and courageous heart. The Buddha Way, the Way of True Reality is right before us; it’s right behind us; it’s above us and below us; it surrounds us, it fills us; we’re in it, we’re on it. Let’s do it.

Here we are. Each of us tiny monks, sitting on our tiny zafus in this tiny building, nestled in this tiny valley, on the edge of this tiny planet somewhere in a rather small galaxy; waiting for the morning star—when the whole universe awakens to its own heart in each one of us.

“If force doesn’t work, use more force.” Sometimes it works; sometimes it makes things worse. Buddha tried by sheer force of will and determination to break through suffering. It didn’t work; it made things a little bit worse. In the midst of his despair, he remembered sitting under the tree as a little boy. He applied that same compassion to everything that arose—opening, accepting without judgment. The clouds of delusion in his mind parted. He became radiant.

The Buddha said ”We are what we think, all that we are arises with our thoughts; with our thoughts, we make our world.” Everything we see, hear, think, etc., is like an inkblot. We put our own spin on it. No wonder cognitive therapy works: when we change our thoughts, we change our world.

I’ll tell you where you can find it. It’s the place of non-thinking. It’s where there is no involvement, no affair, no good, no bad, no pro or con, no movement, no gauging.

I’ll tell you where you can find it. It’s that space between the thoughts. —Even though it seems tiny, it’s really as big as this room, this valley, this earth, bigger. The space between the thoughts. Give it some attention, watch it grow. Know the end of suffering.

What causes suffering? Perhaps it’s trying to avoid suffering. If that’s so, enter the buddhafield where everything is accepted completely in an atmosphere of compassion just as it is. In the center of the buddhafield sits a serene Buddha surrounded by flower petals. Guess who that Buddha is.

Greed arises: Something out there will make me happy. Hate arises: Something out there, if I get rid of it, then I’ll be happy. Delusion arises: Something is confusing me. Put awareness to it with curiosity, tenderness, gentleness, compassion. What do you find? Greed turns to generosity; hate to kindness, delusion to wisdom.

Some express disappointment saying they expected we’d be stricter here. The practice here is very strict—for those who are willing, dedicated, and committed to waking up.

Most of us have “left home” because of some special sensitivity that didn’t feel “at home.” We have made “our home” here only to continue to discover there is no home; that everything is always changing, adapting to arising circumstances.

Watch a squirrel balancing on a small branch. That animal has and continues to evolve to meet its changing world—its eyes, fingers, tail, metabolism always adapting so that life (changing) continues within an always-changing form and context.

There is no home, nothing to stand on, nothing that isn’t changing. And this we can rely on and make our home—the home that is no-home.

I stand looking up at the canopy of the night sky. I hear that if I were to go straight up I would go on forever, arriving back at the same place. In the zendo we are plumbing the depths of the Self, and because there’s nothing there, we go deeper and deeper forever, until we come right back here, back to the Self. It is as vast and limitless an inner space as any outer space. Don’t know how it is out there, but this True Self is full of peace and joy.

Mind and body becoming One: the Mind, our attention; the Body, our breathing and posture. Attention to breath and posture—Mind and Body becoming One. Doing simple things: sitting, walking, eating, working, resting. Meeting each moment with acceptance, which goes beyond the One and the Many. Opens the true heart: kind, compassionate, tender, forgiving. Opens the true mind: vast, all-inclusive, boundless. True Self revealed: moments of pure joy, moments of complete freedom at the center of it all.

About Kosho McCall

It's Hard (Kim Mosley)

2011-06-01T10:51:00.002-05:00

We are dogsitting now.

We just walked the little Maya

so I needed to take a little break.

I really was the one holding

the leash.

About Kim Mosley

Thousand Year Old Footsteps in the Snow (Maku Mark Frank)

2011-06-01T10:50:00.002-05:00

I step outside and watch the snow fall
From darkness into light.
The others have already gone
For dinner in the mess hall.
But the cold feels too good on my face
Not to linger for awhile.

It felt good this morning, also,
After we’d rousted ourselves from slumber at 3:40
To sit straight-backed,
With palms together—
Facing our respective walls
By the time the teacher made his rounds at 4:05.
And after two hours of absolute and utter stillness
Overlaid with daydreams,
And sleepdreams,
And stomach-growling yearning for the bell,
And wondering if I’d make it through the day,
And wondering why the hell I’m doing what I’m doing,
I stumbled out into the pre-dawn blackness
To see a shining silver sickle of a moon,
And Jupiter,
And the black sky—
As black as anything can be.

Ah, but that was light years ago ...
That was this morning.
And anything that is not right now might as well be light years away.
Oh, sure, I’ve glimpsed that absolute and utter stillness
A number of times throughout the day,
But this is why I do this:
So that I can step outside and see the world
With brand new eyes—
Eyes without a “me” to tell me what I’m seeing.

So I hobble though the snow
On my zazen-weary legs,
Leaving thousand year-old footprints in the snow.
And as far as what all this amounts to
Once these bones are in the ground,
And how the hell my sitting facing a wall
For over eleven hours a day
Can make the world a better place ...
Well, I kind of like to think of all of this
Zazen after zazen after zazen
As stitching together the pieces of a robe
To someday be worn
By my great-great-great-great
Granddaughter in the Dharma
As she steps outside into the night
To watch the snow fall
From darkness into light
Before gliding like a shadow to the mess hall
Leaving thousand year old footsteps in the snow.

About Maku Mark Frank

Contributors to this Issue

2011-06-01T10:44:00.008-05:00

Krishna Bhattacharyya has been writing and meditating for about 10 years now. She is originally from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. She loves nature, and likes to write and sing about it.

Edward Espe Brown is a former tenzo at Tassajara, author of Tassajara Cookbook and other books. He received Dharma Transmission from Mel Weitsman and is founder and teacher of Peaceful Sea Sangha. He taught a recent weekend at the Austin Zen Center and at that time wrote the message we have included in Just This.

Maku Mark Frank is a member of Missouri Zen Center in St. Louis. His poem “Thousand Year Old Footsteps in the Snow” was inspired by sitting sesshin at Sanshinji.

Ronnie Gaubatz blogs at ronniegaubatz.wordpress.com about motherhood, relationships, and making a life with breast cancer. The selection comes from her blog, Glass Half Full.

Robert Genn, is recognized as one of Canada's most accomplished painters, and his work is well known internationally. While he has painted in many countries, he is perhaps best known for his work portraying his native Canada. Receive his twice-weekly art-letters by going to: http://www.robertgenn.com/

Kathy Goodwin writes, "I just turned 65. I don't feel older, but it feels like some kind of milestone. I want to travel but have no plans yet except to attend my daughter and son-in-law's joint 40th birthday in Denmark. I would like to return to Tassajara as a work study student in the summer season, to visit my aunt and cousins in LA who I haven't seen for more than 40 years, to walk in Ireland, Scotland and/or England, to see Angkor Wat and Yellowstone, and to canoe part of a river.

Xianyang Carl Jerome studied under Zenshin Philip Whalen Roshi at the Hartford Street Zen Center in San Francisco and is now a student of Master Ji Ru of the Mid-America Buddhist Association in Chicago. He teaches at the North Shore Meditation and Dharma Center in Highland Park, IL. He is a friend of Kim Mosley.

Kosho McCall has shared with us “Encouraging Words for the Path” from his Tanto’s talk late at night in sesshin. Kosho practiced at San Francisco Zen Center for 20 years. He trained for 12 of those years at Tassajara Zen Mountain monastery where he became Head of Monastic Practice. Kosho received Dharma Transmission (authorization to teach) from Zenkei Hartman Roshi in 2003 and became Teacher at Austin Zen Center in May of 2009.

Tyler MacNiven’s video, Kintaro Walks Japan, which tells the story of his walking trip from one tip of Japan to the other, was recommended by former AZC resident, Koji Shinjaku.

Kim Mosley, a co-editor of Just This, was born in Chicago in 1946. He taught at School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Bradley University, Southern Methodist University, Lindenwood University and St. Louis Community College (where he was also Dean of Liberal Arts). His work is in collections including the Art Institute of Chicago, the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, and the Center for Creative Photography in Tucson. His blog, Diaristic Notations, has over 1300 posts of writing and art.

Sarah Webb, a co-editor for Just This, is an English professor retired from the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma, where she is the editor of poetry and fiction for the interdisciplinary magazine, Crosstimbers. Her teacher is Albert Low of the Montreal Zen Centre. She spends her winters tutoring ESL and writing and her summers traveling the West in her van.

Nancy Webber’s photo of the Buddha in the garden reflects her involvement in making the grounds at AZC an inspiring part of practice at the Center. To this task she brought her experience as a landscape designer and interest in a Texas regional interpretation of the zen garden. Nancy volunteers with central Texas environmental causes and is restoring a 60 acre tract of tall grass prairie in southern Milam County where she hopes to live some day in community with other zen practitioners.

Pat Yingst, who wrote of stepping off a 100-foot pole in this issue, began doing Zen meditation in 1988 and has been a member of Austin Zen Center since its inception. She has seven years experience teaching meditation in prisons and is active in the Austin intra-Buddhist prison volunteer organization, Inside Meditation. She served as co-editor for the first five years of Just This. She is partially retired from BMC Software Company, where she still works three days a week as a software developer.

Introduction: Impermanence and Death (Kim Mosley & Sarah Webb)

2011-01-21T11:52:00.020-06:00

K: I read the other day in Steve Hagen's Buddhism, Plain and Simple, "But how can you be truly happy when you have a death sentence on your head?" This is the theme of this issue of JustThis, Austin Zen Center's journal. What I find amazing is that a part of me believes it is the most important question and yet another part doesn't care about my death sentence. Do we hate a romantic interlude because it is going to end? Of course not. William Blake wrote, "...But he who kisses the joy as it flies/ Lives in eternity's sunrise."

I have known people so fearful of death that they are afraid to live. My grandpa said he didn't want any more dogs because it broke his heart when they died. (He lost his wife and true love after only a couple of years of marriage.) Perhaps there is a limit to how much one is willing to mourn.

So I asked my wife this question and she said that you just have to live in the moment. I wondered if this is a delusion, ignoring the elephant in the room. Is there another way? Can we revere the elephant and revere the moment at the same time? I don't want to forget that impermanence is keenly married to death.

S: As for the question you pose at the end, I'd say (right now in my thinking) that what happens in the moment is awareness and awareness comes from outside the self and does not die. Even if we color it with the self, which we do, it comes from outside (One may falsely believe that it is oneself that hears the bird sing in the spring and sees the leaves fall in the autumn. This is not so.—Dogen)

So right now it seems to me that many things about us die in our physical death but perhaps something—not a thing, hmmm...—continues. Not our individual self but the seeing, knowing, beyond the self. That formless which I reduce down into an it when I call it awareness. More mysterious than that but somehow connected to awareness.

And revering the elephant—yes we do die—and living in the moment—now, which never ends--is like form and formlessness. Kim in form worries about death, the you that is beyond form, equally true, doesn't need to.

P.S. Kim sent his teacher (in Chicago) the link to this issue. He responded, "I suspect Sengcan would say that if you have no preferences (you are as the blog calls itself: Just This), then the whole question of death and impermanence would never come up."

About Kim Mosley & Sarah Webb

One Record of the Impermanent (Glen Snyder)

2011-01-21T11:51:00.015-06:00

It was early evening when you blew into the Zen priest's incredible calligraphy showing, more like some blast of hot air from a racing train engine pulling a hundredcar load of freshly bleeding stillsnowcovered timber out of the mountains of my childhood, more like that than like some lover and patron of the Asian arts....so much so that I wondered if anyone else noticed all of the clean blackinkstroked kanji hung out on scrolls for a moment lightly billowing from the walls when you entered. Amongst the shavedheaded priests and some other lessshaved heads filled with urban koan pleasantries and some other heads inside which the reading the Japanese calligraphy was perhaps being done just as easily as reading the newspaper, amongst all that there was the contrast of your twisted yellow hair like wheat fields in the sunset of a clear sky after a bad tornado....amongst the black robes, suits, and December sweaters, there was your crusty spattered denim and wrinkled thriftshop coat looking like they had picked themselves up off the sidewalks on their own accord and just walked inside with you inside them....amongst the muted artistic commentaries of “Oh, this one is my favorite,” there was you just there with not so many words and calloused red hands.

In retrospect, there were reasons why I had avoided telling you I'd be in town this time, even above and beyond worrying that the mind police might indirectly implicate me for your halfparanoid antigovernment manifestos and other ranting essays on injustice that you said you were in the midst of. I mean, who really knows the implications of hanging out with a retired left-wing journalist...perhaps they have airport dogs that sniff that stuff out now, and then they put you on no-fly lists? Yes, and I thought you were the paranoid one. Much easier to let you be the engaged boddhisattva, and for me to be disengaging in everything at that time. Much easier for me to be the good Zen Scout and sit on my cushion looking at the wall with all of the other Zen Scouts and Zen Masters than for me to take you up on the invite and sneak off to a reading at Trieste Café and then later have to duck into the zendo in the middle of walking meditation, uncertain if my own mind or the minds of others could be convincingly wrappable around the nonduality of meditation, beat poetry and anything else in this life and, if that was not the case, of the lame excuse I would feel I was obliged to have to make up as a result. Perhaps I would have told myself something about the nonduality of human experience and the universe both inside and outside the zendo and if there were many universes and not just one, then the nonduality of the myriad universes filled with as many bodhisattvas and other enlightening beings as grains of sand in the Ganges moving about in each one of our sweaty pores, cheering us on, encouraging us, actualizing themselves in us whether we are in the zendo or outside in the chilly December air.

In the months preceeding, there had been the calls at odd hours, the trailingvoiced messages on my cell phone that went as such: “Hey, just got back from a couple of weeks alone in the Sierra Nevadas at the cabin of a friend. Really inspiring there, and wrote some new stuff. What are you up to? Written any new material lately? Give me a ring, my new number is...” And when we did talk you would say: “Oh, just so you know when you call, whatever you do, don't leave a message on the phone. Best just to let it ring twice and hang up. I'll call back. I'm between apartments. And the place I'm staying at here in the city for awhile belongs to an old friend of mine only she doesn't know that I kept a key or that I am hanging out here while she's away.” And so all of that left me worried that maybe like you, I would also become some hermitmonklikebeing that would also wander from place to place: in destitution, hunger, failing health, and lack of any personal reputation. Perhaps by only thinking about it, I was already that...but there was some need at the time to think that I was above that. And also secretly worrying that perhaps you would actually show up knocking on my apartment door halfway across the country sometime. I mean, really, there's not much space in my place anyway and if it's hard enough already to find a girlfriend to hang out with in my present situation, imagine all the harder with you some disheveled homeless bohemian modernday Han Shan crashing out in my place. Why did we share poetry in the first place anyway? You seemed to have an inexhaustible capability for romanticizing about the woman you left in Spain and all of those visceral images of being in love with the Spanish countryside and her voice, and the smell of honey in the air, and on and on, as described in your only book of poetry. I really had no time for any of that realm, since I was busy taking control of my life and looking to the future and not backwards to the images associated with my own failed marriage. The disturbing scenario of your unexpected, and even uninvited, visit played out in my head even though I was so busy with my own selfimprovement things that I never took time to notice that the only disheveled, homeless, halfparanoid poet abiding in my apartment during all those months was really just myself.

So, it was hesitantly good to see you at the calligraphy opening and I'm glad there were no hard feelings, at least expressed. And even though you looked like hell things were looking up, you had found a place to live and your Flamenco girlfriend had come to town and had gathered up a stack of your stuff and had peddled it to the first patriarch of Beat who had looked at it and thought it was pretty good, at least he wrote to you as such, so maybe it would be published after all, at least there was to be a meeting in the near future. It all sounded good. Really good. I was glad for you about that. So, I left you sitting there, more happy than ever in my mind, and went on to look at the calligraphy.

So, six months later, at a random moment, I realized that after the opening, after returning to Houston, without my even noticing, your phone calls had all stopped entirely. Not knowing how to see what's up, since you always were too paranoid, I think, to use email, at least that was my guess, but maybe you had other motives for not using the internet, I ended up using Google to find you...the last place you would really be, and in the end, I didn't really find you, but there was the unexpected memorial. A friend wrote of your life and said that in the end you had died, of kidney failure, in your sleep, with your beautiful Flamenco lover in your arms. And I am sorry I never said goodbye, or even said hello, regretting that I never took you up on the journey to North Beach, but I am happy that things came together in the end. Other poets have now written you tributes, so there is no need for this one, but I shall write it anyway. The strange part is that, of those at the calligraphy opening, no one that I talked to could remember you. I asked around a bit and no one recalled you there or anywhere else that I had met with you. And I find myself somewhat like that bewildered government official running out of the temple chasing after Han Shan in the deep, cold misty peaks. Like Han Shan, you have walked deeply into the mountain itself, and closed rocks and forest in behind you. And I am left only with your verses. In my journeys, I see them written on walls, rocks, gates, and trees. I see them written on clouds, waters, wind, and the reflection of sunlight and moonlight on the waters. I see them written, and I am both uplifted and grateful. Even though I cannot directly thank you, I must directly thank you. Thank you very much.

About Glen Snyder

Older (Sarah Webb, 2007)

2011-01-21T11:51:00.014-06:00

A moment ago I went into the kitchen and stood looking into the broom closet. What was it I wanted? I had to go back to the computer and start to type before I could remember. It happens a lot these days—car keys lost, cell phone lost, idea lost. Everyone over a certain age is acutely aware of the litany of all the things we lose: figure, hair, easy health and easy vigor, suppleness of mind. Our parents are dead or in ill health. Some of our friends have died. Old age is full of loss.

I could try to ignore the loss—thicken my makeup, get a tummy tuck, pretend I wasn’t losing names and dates—but I haven’t chosen to go that route. In fact, I rarely wear makeup. I tell myself that the face in the mirror looks wise. Maybe. Or maybe it just looks faded. At any rate, I’m not trying to hold back an inevitable tide.

The changes are not all bad. Whether or not I am actually wise, I have learned many things. I tutor Mexican immigrants (legal and illegal) in English and use my years of teaching to find the best ways to help them learn. It comes much easier than when I was a teacher starting out. And I have won through to a peaceful life. I wouldn’t be 31 again for anything—such melodrama!

But there is this slow decline that draws my attention. Arthritis makes it hard to hike and impossible to backpack, and it cuts my sesshins down to four days. Pain is a constant. Aging and death are often in my mind, like a loose tooth the tongue wiggles. So I use it, grist for the mill.

Let it go, I tell myself, practice for letting harder things go. You forgot your friend’s name? Let your embarrassment go. My body has thickened and softened. Increased exercise has a place, but I also have to do some letting go. My body is never going to look like it did at 20. It’s a practice, turning away from clinging. Sometimes I am able to give way and accept the loss. Sometimes it is harder, but the thing about old age is the issue will come up over and over. Here’s a loss, deal with it.

Another practice that comes up is turning-into. I was always one to run away from what I felt. Numbness, denial, a muffled depression. In Zen I learned to turn into the feeling, like turning into the current coming down a stream. At every stage in my life I’ve had to work on feeling what I feel. So I look into the grief I sometimes feel and let it emerge from the muffling folds that have hidden it. When my dog Shasta died this summer, I found the loss very hard. She had been with me for sixteen years, and since I live alone since I retired, she had been my primary companion for the last four. Nursing her through what turned out to be a fatal illness was very hard. Her deterioration horrified me and brought up memories of how my mother wasted away in Alzheimer’s. But after her death I gave myself quiet to feel the grief. I chanted for her. Gradually the sorrow eased.

Shasta’s death brought up questions. Do we die? Does some part of us live on? What are we at root?

I can’t say, as I did when I was young, Oh, I’ll live to be an old woman. I remember counting up how old my grandmothers had been when they died (82 and 88) and telling myself, So, you’ll live that long anyway. My brother’s death at 50 taught me that there are no guarantees. And my mother’s long, hard death at 89 taught me you don’t necessarily want to live as long as possible.

I hang around with a friend who is 100. She’s an amazing woman who survived the bombing of Berlin with toddlers in tow as she ran for bomb shelters, a dancer once, still a writer and a naturalist. She was a camp host in the National Forests until she was 96. So she’s kept her physical and mental abilities far longer than most people. But this last year, she’s been slipping. I arrive to take her to a club meeting, and more often than not she will have forgotten we are going anywhere. When we went on the yearly Bird Count, she, who had been the key identifier, could no longer remember the birds’ names. She said she did not recognize her daughter when her daughter came to visit. Who was that wrinkled, yellow-skinned old woman sitting on her sofa? That disturbed her. Yet I find her bright-eyed and funny, still herself, when I come to pick her up.

I think of my mother, with her brain so eroded by Alzheimer’s she rarely woke, staring at me with a long silver gaze. She could not speak but she could look, and she looked and looked. She died later that week, and I realized that had been her goodbye. What was she as she looked? And after she died?

The decline of old age is not just a matter of losing words and keys and physical strength. It is a drifting away of many things we thought we were. As they go, we mourn them and, I hope, we let them go. We ask ourselves, does anything last? Does anything of me and those I love last? And we look inside to see.

Postscript: Since this essay was written in 2007, many things have changed. Sesshins went from 4 days back to 7 and maybe now to 0. I shared my house with a little stray dog for a couple of years, and now with a giant, puppyish hound dog. My friend passed away this month at the age of 103.

About Sarah Webb

In 99 Years (Kim Mosley)

2011-01-21T11:50:00.004-06:00

Her gray hair was thin,
tired of many years
of endless
combing and brushing.

The silvered strands
were expertly cut—
they could not have been
better cared for,
considering her
age.

She smiled for the lens.
Her mouth formed
a polished camera
facial expression.

She had been
on that side
of the lens
many times before—
it was apparent

as she was able to combine
a wry suspicion
with a pseudo-authentic smile,
making it all seem pleasing in the end.

There was a hard,
Eastern-European texture
to her face.

She had not chosen mud
and other beauty facial treatments,
rather had lived an adventurous
yet privileged life.

Her smile said,
"I've seen much of life
in 99 years, and
now it is yours
to enjoy and tend."

She wore a black scarf
wrapped around her neck,
giving some dimension
to her very small body

that sat onto
a polka-dotted shawl,
which was inside
and partially covered by
another larger shawl,
laced with gold thread.

Her forearms and hands
emerged
from the third shawl.

The arms were larger
than one might expect
coming from
such a petite figure.

These (almost workman) arms,
as familiar
gardening
as editing books,
lay one upon
the other
in a warm gesture.

There was no tension,
but the weight of one arm
on the other
seemed a little more
than she could bear,

causing her smile
now to tighten and
not seem
quite as relaxed
as her face
first suggested.

Her skirt exhibited
a similar
but darker dot pattern
to the smaller of the two shawls.

Her legs
appeared to be tired,
at 99,
as they struggled to
hold up her arms,

with dignity,
as a pedestal holds
tirelessly
a death mask.

About Kim Mosley

The Fall (Vickie Schubert)

2011-01-21T11:47:00.005-06:00

First heavy frost,
early in the frigid morning,
silence is punctuated,
by sounds on roof and screen.
Dawn has arrived and
the kiss of the sun
has nudged the pecan leaves,
persuaded them to free themselves
from the trees’ control.
Against the cerulean backdrop they fall.
Some drift and gently twirl,
others plunge in kamikaze dives,
yet others drop in clusters,
exquisite ballet troupes in group step
as they spiral to the ground.
One by one,
each leaf letting go and
descending gracefully
in its unique way,
accepting its destiny
at the perfect time.
Melting frost dusts
the lawn with cool wetness onto which
this waterfall of leaves spills,
creating a delicate mosaic
of citron, gold, and green,
a tribute to the magnificence of impermanence.

About Vickie Schubert

Tree Image (Amy Lindsay-Joynt)

2011-01-21T11:46:00.004-06:00

About Amy Lindsay-Joynt

I Ask for Silence (Glen Snyder)

2011-01-21T11:45:00.005-06:00

NOW just leave me be.
Now get used to being without me.

I am going to close my eyes

And I only want five things,
five preferred roots.

One is endless love.

The second is to see Autumn.
It cannot be without the leaves
flying about and returning to earth.

The third is the deep Winter,
the rain that I loved, the caress
of fire in the wild cold.

In fourth place is Summer
round like a watermelon.

The fifth thing is your eyes,
my Matilde, beloved,
I don't wish to sleep without your eyes,
I don't wish to be without your gaze:
I trade in Spring
for you to keep on looking at me.

Friends, this is what I wish.
It is nearly nothing and nearly everything.

Now I want you all to go away.

I have lived so much that one day
you will have to forget me on purpose,
erasing me from the blackboard:
my interminable heart.

But just because I ask for silence
do not think that I am going to die:
for me it is just the opposite:
it so happens that I am going to live.

It so happens that I am and I continue.

It will not be, though, unless inside
of me there will grow cereals,
the grains that first break
the earth to see the light,
but mother earth is dark:
and inside me is dark:
I am like a well upon whose waters
the night leaves behind its stars
and continues alone in the countryside.

It is all about how much I have lived
that I want to live a bit more.

I have never felt so sonorous,
I have never had so many kisses.

Now, as always, it is early.
Light flies on by with its bees.

Leave me alone with the day.
I ask permission to be born.
—Pablo Neruda

(Glen Snyder, trans)

About Glen Snyder

Over Town Lake (Betty Gross)

2011-01-21T11:44:00.005-06:00

Moonlight strikes water
Ending, beginning entwine
No harm to water

About Betty Gross

Along the San Gabriel (Sarah Webb)

2011-01-21T11:43:00.006-06:00

Along the San Gabriel

on the river where my father died
water wavers over stone

About Sarah Webb

Enshrined (Brandon Lamson)

2011-01-21T11:40:00.005-06:00

I cannot climb the narrow path
to Suzuki’s shrine, above the creek
that floods during thunderstorms,
turning spring gardens to mud.
Legend says that Koi strong enough
to swim upstream against the current
become dragons once they reach the source.
Students spread his ashes beside
his favorite tree, an oak
whose limbs sculpted by light
and wind reach over the valley.
Sunrise, fog burns from the peaks
of the Santa Lucia mountains,
my friends’ laughter carrying
as they find Lupine, Humming Bird
Sage and Indian Paintbrush.
I don’t need to see it, the tree
or the wildflowers or the makeshift altar;
I can bow right here in the dirt
and surrender, burrow like a mole
underground into mulch and loam,
a compost turning the center
of my fear: shavings of red
orange bark, bear berries, wolf scat.
We practice this way, in the dark,
opening to our blindness
like the barn owl I often visited
that was rescued and taken
to a wetlands sanctuary near my house,
placed in a small aviary with a sign:
Blind owl struck by drunk driver.
Very sensitive to noise.
Please do not disturb.
Those eyes, luminous inkwells
in a white clock face
that followed me as I stood outside
its wire cage, feeling my lungs expand
with fetid air from the marsh below,
an understory where spirits hissed
curled in the roots of cypress trees,

rising in clouds of mosquitoes
that furred my arms and drank,
the owl a stillness inside them,
a ghost monk drenched in his robes.

About Brandon Lamson

Death Row at the Dentist (Kim Mosley)

2011-01-21T11:39:00.003-06:00

About Kim Mosley

No and Yes (Kim and Jasper Mosley)

2011-01-21T11:38:00.004-06:00

A letter to my four year-old grandson:

Jasper,

The other day I refused to read the book that told me about the rest of my life. Good thing, too, since the book does not exist. I like the fact that each day brings us something new.

This morning I received your video, where you so beautifully discuss the meaning of yes and no. That is such a quandary in Chinese, since they don't have words for yes or no. If you ask, "is the soup ready?" they simply answer, "it is ready" or "it is." So you see, we can function without those words "yes" and "no" that we use so often. It is a lot faster to say "yes" in answer to "are you ready for dessert" than to say "I am ready for dessert." But the Chinese were not in a hurry. At least, that is what we were told. Now they are in a hurry, rushing around like there is no tomorrow (that's an expression that you can figure out yourself).

I received another email today, this one from my Austin teacher asking me to consider a poem for the Zen journal I edit. It was a fine poem, but it was about now (the present moment) rather than about birth and death, which is the subject of the next issue. So I wrote him that it wasn't about birth and death, but maybe we could make the issue after birth and death to be an issue about "now," since now is between birth and death. He wrote back that there is no in between birth and death, and that, anyway, birth and death are ideas.

I wrote back that death being an idea would be an interesting defense in a murder trial. Suppose one of the mouse traps went off that we set in your house and "caught" the mouse. And suppose it was against the law to end of lives of mice, as it is to end the lives of dogs. So then whoever set the trap would be arrested and they would stand trial for ending the life of a mouse. And the lawyer for the accused (I think I set the trap, so I'd have to come back to Philadelphia to stand trial as the accused)... the lawyer for the accused would argue that I can't be accused of breaking a crime because ending the life of a mouse is just an idea, and we don't have laws, at least criminal laws, about ideas. I'm sure you follow this, and if you don't, that's ok too.

So I took a nap (because your grandma told me I needed to do that if I wanted to go out...which I do) and when I woke up I thought about there being nothing in between birth and death. So if you think about it then I think you'll see that it makes sense. Since you are growing you are being born. It is a gradual process. When you started your life you were smaller than the head of a pin. When you were about as heavy as brick, you came out into the world from your mom. Now you are as heavy as 5 or 6 bricks. Your dad is as heavy as almost 25 bricks. At some point, we stop growing and we start dying. Nothing to worry about though, because, like "birthing," that takes a very long time. Except for the mouse who is hungry for peanut butter.

But don't worry about the mice in your house, because any good Philadelphia mouse prefers peanut butter with sugar to your better-for-you Trader Joe's peanut butter. So the mouse, you, me, and everyone else who are around are still birthing to deathing. And so birth and death are really one, and they really are just ideas in our minds, and now... what is now? Maybe that's for another letter. OK?

Grandpa Kim

P.S. I sent this to my teacher. He replied, "Kim Oy! The rest of the idea reads thus: There is no absolute birth and no absolute death, and what is born is born and what dies dies. Smiles,..."

About Kim Mosley

Balance (Dwayne Bohuslav/Joanne Brigham)

2011-01-21T11:37:00.005-06:00

The Vernal Equinox, which was on March 20, 2010 this past year, is an important day in the Buddhist calendar because it is a day of harmony. Midway between the solstices, light and dark balance one another. It is, therefore, an opportunity to reflect upon BALANCE in life.

Emerging from winter, the Vernal Equinox marks the beginning of spring. Out of death, life re-emerges in an endless iteration. It is exactly the time when dark and light/death and life/moon and sun are in balance with one another, and so it is seen as a time when our lives are in balance – or can be. It is an important time in Buddhism for that reason, since Buddhism is about the Middle Way.

Hell, evil, pain, old age and death. Heaven, good, pleasure and birth. On the days of spring and autumnal equinox, accordingly, there is no predominance either way. This has been described as, “The Buddha delights in the Middle Way.” But the Equinox is fleeting…

This “Middle Way” is not achieved after death, it is not separable from life. It is not another place; it is a way of being in this time and place. You are in Hell and you are in Heaven depending on how you see the world and by the manner in which you are in the world. However ephemeral, the Equinox is a reminder of where we want to be internally. It is a reminder that the Buddhist view of the
world is that everything is one.

HCG Gallery

Suspended from the structure and in response to the space, an inclined plane became our “floating world”.

The nature of the ephemeral object leads to investigations of Tibetan Thangka painting and The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter, the oldest surviving Japanese work of fiction, and haunting images of its heroine, Kuguya-hime’s, “Return to the Moon”. Steel, metal fabric, mechanisms…

Field and objects are set in motion from the rhythms of the moon and gravitational pulls, “Spring tides/Neap tides”; bellows/ breathing; male/female. A “physical response” to the physics of the space, here maintaining equilibrium in a place where polarities exist. Sticks, strings, beads and bottles…

All of this process arrives at the Vernal Equinox, the date of the opening performance.

What divine source or cosmic source or human source brings us to places of harmony?

BALANCE.
The Comfort of Gravity.

After the opening performing installation, BALANCE remained in place for one month and then was disassembled back down to its individual components. No thing lasts. This helps us live. Impermanence.

About Dwayne Bohuslav

Atacama Desert photos (Glen Snyder)

2011-01-21T10:24:00.004-06:00

Journeying through the Atacama desert, a land where wars had been fought to secure the world's only saltpeter deposits just over a century ago. Now there are only ghost towns, abandoned since the 1920s. We stopped by the cemeteries where the wooden crosses are the only remains of a cruel life in the desert. Of the flowered wreaths that once adorned the cemetery, only wire hoops remain.

About Glen Snyder

Tragedies (Kim Mosley)

2011-01-21T10:23:00.007-06:00

Friday morning: My cousin wrote yesterday about Treme, an HBO dramatization of Katrina's impact on the Treme neighborhood. I watched the trailer (below) and requested it on Netflix, so someday I'll see it.

Not only was Katrina a terrible tragedy, but the recent oil spill has added "insult onto injury."

That said (and felt), I started to think about the elephant in the room. We are all on death row. (You probably didn't want to hear that.) Today our circumstances maybe be a lot better than Treme. But we are essentially in the same boat (some may crucify me for saying that). We are prone to sickness, heartbreak, and death. Prone is a euphemism. All our attachments will depart someday. Even the Earth, as we know it, will go away. And yet we smile. And yet we feel compassion for those less fortunate.

In the 80s, I met a few who were struck with AIDS. They knew they were on death row, and they could predict when their execution would occur. Yet they had an air of contentment that I had never seen before. In spite of (or because of) their certain demise (medicine is prolonging that now), they were able to have a certain strength to enjoy each moment for what it was. No more pretending about the elephant.

Later Friday: All was going well in my life, though my cough comes and goes (mostly comes, or at least, so it seems right now). In any case, a terrible tragedy occurred today to a different cousin and we all mourn for him. The elephant sometimes appears at the least predictable times or places. I dedicate this drawing to my cousin.

My son and I visited him last fall, and shared with him a bottle of wine watching the Oregon sunset. He loved the ocean as he did telling a good story. We shall miss him.

About Kim Mosley

Not Enough (Rick Wadsworth)

2011-01-21T10:21:00.003-06:00

When I left you (there in the hospice bed) I knew it would be the last time I’d see you.
The next time I’d see you, you would be dead, not there, a corpse.
And I knew this.
It was not, I may never see you again
(well Rick you may never see him again)
No it was not that.
It was certain
I was certain I’d never see you again.

So I threw my face onto yours
My arms over you withering
And
Trying for molecular fusion
Squeezed hard
And pled
I love you Dad,
I’ve always loved you ,
You were a good father,
I knew you loved me.

And no matter how hard I squeezed
No matter how long I squeezed
No matter how often I said these words…

IT WAS NOT ENOUGH

Maybe to stay would have been enough.
Maybe to stay until the last moment of our life
Would have been enough?
Enough for what?

So no , no, no
Nothing, no time, no words, no touch, no smell, no taste, no sight, no thoughts, no words
Nothing
NOTHING will ever BE Enough.

About Rick Wadsworth

Excerpts (Phil Gable)

2011-01-21T09:56:00.007-06:00

The following blog entries from Phil Gable are slimmed down from his longer blog chronicling his life this last year as he fought cancer. The full blog is accessible at http://philgable.blogspot.com

Sunday, July 5, 2009
The love in my life

When I first announced that I had been diagnosed with bladder cancer I expected the usual flurry of "get wells" and "best wishes" all the usual Hallmark greeting card expressions that I'll admit I've often relied on over the years. After all, what do we say to someone who is contemplating a possibly imminent death sentence? "Well, good luck with that"? The response in my case was something I found quite surprising. Over and over, I've heard: "I love you."

Thank you all from the bottom of my heart.

Wednesday, July 8, 2009
The hundred foot pole

Several kind people have commented to me that my Zen training must have prepared me well for what I'm facing. That notion is lovely but I have a sense that if I start believing it, my suffering will become greater. I fully expect that I will fail to keep my sense of self as victim in conscious perspective at all times. In those moments, I'll hopefully want to avoid the gaining idea that somehow I didn't train hard enough, or I wasn't a good enough Zen student. Between now and Monday I will focus on doing what's right in front of me. Right now that doesn't include much bodily pain. When I wake up from surgery, I expect the pain will provide a powerful focus for my mind just as it does during extended meditation periods.

Sometimes I think we are like the guy who falls off the top of the 10 story building and about half way down the people on the fifth floor hear him exclaim: So far, so good! I've spent a good part of my life ignoring the ground rushing up to meet me. Can't ignore it anymore. I've jumped off the top of the hundred foot pole. Nothing to do but trust the universe completely. Nothing to do but live this life I've been given.

Friday, July 10, 2009
Hurry up, wait

Just when I think I can actually see through the illusion of personal power, something really surprising comes along and forces me to see how much I was relying on my plans and strategies to deal cope with life.

I had spent the last five days getting myself ready for the projected ordeal of major surgery/five days in the hospital/one month recovery at home. I was all set. Clients taken care of. Had a small going away party set up for Sunday night. Had convinced myself that I was strong and would be able to live through this transition, maybe even realize its transformative potential. Thank you Mara. Your comforting delusion actually worked for a while. I was ready.

Then Dr. Williamson called to tell me the surgery has to be put off for a week. The fellow surgeon who was to help him perform the operation had a death in the family and had to postpone. It felt so weird to notice my disappointment at not going into the hospital three days from now. To see my shock and dismay that now that I had so carefully prepared myself, I might have to hold onto that preparation for another 10 days. Somehow the idea of "psyching" myself for that long seems like too much work, now. And kind of pointless. This next week, I'm recommitting to letting go of plans and ideas that will save me. I'm recommitting to just supporting Life completely. Moment by moment. Thy will be done.

Monday, July 13, 2009
This too, is for your benefit

When my surgery was rescheduled I felt a sense of loss. Loss of time. Loss of opportunity. Loss of preparedness. And yet, there were a number of things that came up around the rescheduling that could be seen as gain. Thanks to the heroic efforts of Randy Eisenman and his powerful network of friends, I was able to get shortlisted for a second opinion at MD Anderson.

Right now, I'm thinking that in this loss there is gain. That all of this is somehow for my benefit and the benefit of those whose respond. If not for this disease, I would not have felt the outpouring of love and affection from so many people. My grandson Mac would not have been introduced to so many wonderful people offering him their wisdom. I would not have been able to reconnect with my good friend and colleague Cindy Wigglesworth or some old friends of ours in the Woodlands this week. I would not have found the energy to complete the first draft of our book.

Saturday, July 18, 2009
Change of plan, change of mind

Turns out my second opinion was worse than the first. And yet my spirits are high, my equanimity generally restored. Thursday I met with Dr. John Ward III at MD Anderson. He was terrific. Clear, Cogent, Cognitively brilliant, and Compassionate. I got to experience all the wonderful "C" words after almost three weeks of dealing with the dreaded one. He explained to me that my tumor had micro-pappillary (sp?) features meaning it had very likely sent free floating cancer cells throughout my body where they will eventually hook-up with a million of their buddies and grow another cancer somewhere. He told me that MDA has a relatively new method of dealing with this situation which is to do two months of intensive chemo first. Then take the bladder and build me a new one. Then watch me closely for signs of new cancers. This was, at first, very disorienting and shocking. Especially when I learned that the 5 year survival rate for this is 50%. Yet as direct and confident as Dr Ward was when he told me his opinion, he was equally direct and confident when he said "This thing is beatable."

I have an all-star team, a best of the best group of physicians who seem very interested in helping me beat this thing. My spirits have been high all day. I did a half day silent retreat this morning and my meditations were still and deep. I met with two different Zen teachers this morning in private interview and actually found myself, authentically in-the-moment describing my situation to one of them as "kind of cool."

It seems that in addition to changing my plans, I've changed my mind:

I am no longer "dying of cancer" I'm "living with cancer." My dying will only take a moment. It will be that moment when I expel my last breath. Everything else before that is living. I intend to do it wholeheartedly.

PS Good real time Zen joke: I'm due to be ordained as a priest this year. As a traditional part of the ceremony a monk's head is shaved except for a small circular patch called a "shira" That last patch is shaved off as the defining moment of the ceremony. Well, my crazy immune system has prevented me from growing hair for the past 15 years and my teacher was trying to figure out how to alter the ceremony as a work-around. Not much came to mind. Now, there's a good chance that my chemo compromised immune system will actually allow me to grow hair in time for the ceremony. When I pointed out that at the very least this situation had "solved the shira problem" my teacher burst out in hearty laughter. In loss there is gain lol.

Monday, July 20, 2009
50/50 now 60/40

Met with my Oncologist today Dr Arlene Sierfker-Radtke.

I should be able to work, to meet clients around my chemo schedule and the surgery schedule. I'll probably regain my high spirits again after a few nights good sleep. My equanimity is pretty good right now. Nothing bad is happening in this moment. In fact, just reaching out to all of you and feeling you reach back is very sustaining.

Saw a t-shirt at Zen Center one day that helped me put all this in perspective. It said: Eat right. Exercise. Meditate. Still die.

Saturday, July 25, 2009
Gassho

I've just received my first round of four rounds of chemo and among the post infusion instructions I've received are to avoid handshakes and hugs as my T-cells will be low and I'll be very susceptible to infection. No problem! You all can just expect to see me "gassho" when we meet. I kind of like that idea. Mainstreaming "gassho" could change our whole society (lol)

My first gassho (bow of gratitude) today is for everyone at MD Anderson who worked so flawlessly to help me and Paula get through this first round of chemo.

I had 31 continuous hours of chemicals administered into a blood source near my heart through a "pick line" a catheter that starts near my elbow and follows a vein into my chest. The pick line will be with me for the duration of the chemo. I am Borg. Resistance is futile.

The chemo ended at 4 pm Thursday. We stayed over with Cindy Wigglesworth (God bless you Cindy!) and I drove home Friday. Yes, I drove. I'm feeling fine so far. Spirits are still high. And something has shifted. I've got a brave new confident attitude about this thing. I used to wake up 3-4 times a night in a sweat with the thoughts of premature death. Paula would hold me until they passed. Last night she got an uninterrupted 8 hours of sleep. I woke up 3 times but each time my thoughts were powerful and positive. I'm going to beat this thing.

Tuesday, July 28, 2009
The light of peace

This morning, about 10:15, a business meeting I was expecting to attend didn't happen, and I felt a need to go rest. I went to our room and lay down, gently closing my eyes but not sleeping. Within a few moments I experienced what I can only describe as a kind of healing light energy flowing not so much over me or around me or through me but as me. I had no sense of my "self" being separate from this light energy, or that it was "working on me." I did not feel bathed in it, warmed by it or infused with it. The experience was more like I was the light. Eyes open or eyes closed, everything appeared bright and exceptionally clear. Visual contrasts were sharp but not unpleasant. As if all of a sudden, I had perfect vision--even with my glasses off.

More remarkable than the physical manifestations of this experience though were the sentient ones. I felt completely at ease, comfortable, safe, non-anxious--neither "grounded" nor "floating" but just fully, fully present. I felt at peace. I felt not so much loved as love itself. I remained in this state for an hour and a half. When I arose to attend my next meeting, there was no reluctance. It was simply time to move. As I stood up, I felt a knowing in my body that my healing has begun.

It is now over nine hours later. I haven't slowed down or needed to rest since. I've had two extensive client meetings, driven 30 miles or so, had dinner with friends and I'm still going strong. I am not experiencing nausea--my appetite is robust. I'm not feeling tired---I feel really really energized. I don't feel sick at all. I feel very,very healthy. I feel Alive.

Like all states the experience this morning is temporary. I may very well feel terrible tomorrow. But I don't expect to. However, I now have a clear sense that while the sense of health I currently feel may come and go, rise and fall, the Reality underlying my experience is constant, infinite, vast and lacking nothing.

Monday, August 3, 2009
Confidence

Met with Dr Siefker today. She has a real presence, a directness and concentrated attention that I really appreciate. I even invited her to check out my "woo-woo" posts and she said that research shows that people with community support, family support, faith, and a positive attitude tend to have better outcomes. I think her jury is still out on healing vision while in a deep meditative state :-)

In any event, those experiences of "being Light" continue. Some have become quite animated. I'm resisting making too much meaning of it all. Just grateful that when it happens I come away refreshed, renewed and in high spirits.

Today, I got to meet with the team from work by teleconference. I got to feel the kind of caring and support that Dr Siefker spoke of. Thank so much!

Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Intimacy

I'm writing this post in order to clarify something that has been a bit vague and unintegrated for me. So please don't take this as me teaching anyone but myself.

"First there is a mountain, then no mountain, then there is." I am coming to understand this old zen saying as a description of three stages of intimacy. Three stages that give rise to three levels or perhaps states of a decreasing sense of separation between our felt sense of "self" and our felt sense of "other."

This observation arose for me during my stay this week for the second round of chemo at MDA. My infusions began at 10:30 pm. The night nurse who greeted me seemed perhaps not as experienced or confident as the other nurses who have tended to me. She got a bit defensive when I reminded her to write the schedule of my doses on the schedule board. She got more irritated when I pointed out that I believed she had scheduled the anti-nausea medicine too early. Instead of checking, she went ahead with what she thought was right. We saw each other as "other." We divided the our worlds into two. Nurse and patient. The one in charge. The one not in charge. Me here. Mountain there.

15 hours later it was time to take a four hour dose of Cisblatine--the chemo that is primarily responsible for causing severe nausea. By now the anti-nausea dose I had been given had worn off and I was faced with the prospect of receiving only post infusion remedies for sickness instead of prophylactically addressing the issue. I explained my problem to my new nurse and her first response was "I'm sorry. You're right, we should have waited until now. But we can't really re-administer the medicine." In that moment as our eyes met and she saw the anxiety and fear in my face, something softened. Some line between us blurred. "Well, she said, "I suppose we could give you one of the two you were supposed to receive because it will be out of your system by now." Call it empathy, call it nurturing, I call it intimacy. She really understood, could put herself in my place. We were not mountains opposing each other. Those mountains were gone for the time and in their place was a state experience of not being separate.

Which leads me to the third stage of intimacy where mountains are mountains again, but not seen in the same way. I have experienced this stage as repeated states of non-dual consciousness. Shikantaza, my meditation practice, has afforded me sometimes prolonged glimpses of a greater Unity. Of "things as they is" as Suzuki Roshi is reported to have said. In this state/stage body and mind drop away anything added. No stories are necessary. Genpo Roshi calls this "Big Mind/Big Heart." Recently I've experienced it another way as "being the Light" This stage transcends and includes the previous two. So Mountains are Mountains again--I am aware of the sense of separation and yet I know simultaneously at another level that there are no boundaries save the ones my mind creates. In this way compassion arises.

Wednesday,September 16, 2009
The threads that connect us

I've gotten through my fourth and final round of chemo and I have until October 26th to recover. That's the day of my surgery. Along the way, I've found out that I don't have cancer in growing my bones and the most recent biopsy showed no lymphatic invasion. But I still have the microscopic cancer cells that are probably circulating in my system to worry about. Hopefully the chemo got 'em. On top of that relatively good news, I got some really good news.

I have a date set for my ordination as a Zen priest. December 12th at AZC in Austin. This is the culmination of 18 years of steady practice and working with a teacher. Prior to the date being set I was told to start sewing my priests robes. (actually I restarted for the third time in ten years :-)

This is an enormously complicated project. A piece of black cloth about the size of a bed sheet is measured and cut into 21 pieces. Those pieces are then pinned and sewn back together in a quilt like pattern requiring thousands of hand stitches--each put in with a chant. The success of each stitch is measured in millimeters. Stitches that don't meet the sewing teacher's approval are taken out and re-sewn. The robe is called an Okesa. To put this in perspective, my sewing teacher and I worked three hours this afternoon squaring the okesa and pinning the short side borders. Normally we allow a year for this whole project to be completed. In addition to the Okesa there is the Zagu a bowing cloth that while not large is very complicated to sew. Then there is the Rakasu a recreation of the Okesa scaled down to about 10"x12" and worn around the neck. Finally, the envelopes for each of these need to be cut and sewn.

When I began this project the Tempter of Delusion Mara came to me and told me I would become the next great Zen sewing artisan. That I would go from a guy who could barely thread a needle to a priest with full expertise in this arcane craft. Then the Buddha came along and gifted me with this cancer. (This too is for my benefit :-) and everything changed. Suddenly I my hands shook too badly, my body needed more and more rest, sewing time was replaced with hours and hours of infusions and trips to MDA. Most importantly I had to learn how to go from "the strong one" the "one who is there for others" to the vulnerable one. The one who needs help, who needs to be held and to accept compassion.

So along with the cancer, the Buddha also sent me Sangha--the Zen communities with whom I have practiced. One of our previous sewing teachers undertook to sew the Zagu. My wife Paula picked up the needle and began putting in lines. My current teacher allows me spend as much time watching and learning as actually sewing and pinning. My former teacher Dai En Bennage from Mount Equity in Pennsylvania and her group undertook the Rakasu---sewing it with thread left over from one of DaiEn's robes. So the threads that connect us became not just metaphorical but actual. The whole project will be done ahead of time.

I guess I'm just really sensitive right now but I well up every time I think of how all these people some of whom I haven't seen in almost a decade rallied to support me. And I reflect on how being "the strong one" is really just another defense put up by my ego. A defense that was long overdue to be torn down. I'm discovering the joy in vulnerability. The peace that comes with surrender. Reminds me of a sign in the AZC kitchen: "Barn's burnt down. Now I can see the moon."

Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Facing the brutal facts

I’m sorry it’s been so long since I’ve written, but I have some pretty bad news and I wanted to wait until after the holidays to tell you about it. On October 26 I had an operation to remove my bladder and build a new one using a piece of my bowel. It was a long, difficult, 9-1/2 hour procedure that required ten days at MD Anderson Cancer Center for recovery before I could be sent home.

The operation was a success and during the two weeks following the surgery I seemed to be getting stronger and was feeling much better. [But] suddenly, I got hit with a pulmonary embolism (PE). Blood clots in my legs broke lose, migrated to my lungs and left me unable to take even a single step without gasping for air. I was rushed by ambulance to South Austin Hospital, where I spent a week on blood thinners, just getting stabilized after this life threatening condition.

From there I was transferred to St. David’s Rehab Hospital, where the skill and determination of the doctors, nurses, Occupational and Physical Therapists (OT’s and PT’s) brought about a significant improvement in my condition. I was once again able to walk short distances with the help of my trusty walking stick. My appetite returned and I readied myself for a trip back to MD Anderson for what I thought would be additional chemotherapy.

Unfortunately, as I learned when I talked to my oncologist, my pathology report following the operation indicated a poor prognosis. Microscopic cancer cells were found in 37 of the 60 lymph nodes they removed. To make matters worse, the PE disqualified me from the clinical trial that I was enrolled in for a drug called Avastin, One of Avastin’s known side effects is that it can cause circulatory problems. My physician, citing her oath to do no harm, said she could no longer treat me with Avastin for fear of killing me. With that, my active treatment at MD Anderson ended.

The good news is that my first set of CT’s found no evidence of additional cancers, which both my oncologist and surgeon found somewhat surprising and encouraging. I am also looking into some alternative medical treatments. The bad news is that there’s a 90% chance the cancers will return and if they do, it is likely they will take my life.

I am now scheduled to return every eight weeks for scans to determine whether or not additional cancers have formed. Those are the brutal facts.

January 12, 2010
Hello. Goodbye.

Paula and I just returned from a wonderful trip back to our hometowns in Pennsylvania to see friends and family during the holiday season. One of the friends we visited, Susan Herrick, was unaware of the severity of my condition and when I described it to her, she got teary. She came around to where I was sitting, took my hand in hers, and said, “I don’t want to say goodbye.”

I replied, “I’m not here to say goodbye. I’m just here to say hello.” And then something inspired me to sing, “I don’t know why you say goodbye. I say hello. Hello. Hello.”

It broke Susan’s mood. She jumped up, went to the piano and started picking out the tune. I am writing to you not to say goodbye but to say hello and to thank all of you for the wonderful love and support, the caring, the prayers, the cards, the calls, the e-mails and text messages. They kept me going through some very dark times.

I am actually feeling OK right now. What I am, mostly, is curious. How will this amazing story work out?”

Sunday, February 21, 2010
Three Kisses for Opa

For the past three weeks Paula and I have been traveling. First to attend an ILP graduation in Dallas. Then weather finally permitting, to Asheville NC to visit my children and grandchild as well as to introduce ourselves to the teachers at the Wind Horse Zendo in Asheville.

In September when I saw my Grandson, Mac, he was a baby. Suddenly, at 20 months, he's become a little boy. It took only a few minutes for him to start calling me Opa. One evening as his bed time approached, his mom and dad invited him to say goodnight to the people in the room with a kiss. When it was my turn, he looked at me with a beaming face, said "Opa!" and toddled over as fast as he could to plant one on my cheek.

The room erupted with laughter, applause and the requisite "oohs." Mac then made his way back across the room where his parents stood waiting to take him to his crib. As his Dad reached down for him, Mac suddenly did an about face and ran back to kiss me on the cheek again. More laughter and approval encouraged Mac to do it a third time, giggling all the way as he managed to milk a few more minutes before having to go to bed.

I love you all,

Koso

Saturday, February 27, 2010
Dead man walking???

Got the results of my scans on Thursday and the cancer is back. Three nodules in the intestines. My oncologist made it official. My cancer is now considered incurable. She gives me 4-6 months without treatment. 6-12 with chemo. You might think I'm depressed and anxious but I'm not. In fact my spirits remain strong. After meeting with the folks at MDA, I called Bill, my homeopathic consultant, who has a completely different script for me to follow. Bill's prediction is, that if I follow the regimen he's given me, within 4 months I'll see a reversal of the cancer growth and within another 4-5 months it will disappear. [H]is script is a lot better than the one from MDA. His story has a happier ending :-) So we are going to move to Asheville, NC to be close to family and to practice at the Wind Horse Zen Center. The next six months, I suppose, will write another chapter in this tale. Perhaps the last chapter, perhaps not. Either way is okay.

Meanwhile I'd like to share with you a quote from Zen teacher John Tarrant that I recently read on the Austin Zen Center discussion listserv. It struck me as particularly salient considering the certainty with which MDA predicts my imminent demise and the certainty with which Bill predicts my “Zen people talk about emptiness because when you awaken, the maps that hold your beliefs are suddenly gone. You also notice that new maps appear in the mind, even without encouragement from you. And as new maps appear, you can take them as provisional.

The Zen task is to open to the gates of the world beyond our prejudices. Like the Buddha, we can step away from everything we are certain about. I think this possibility is the best contribution we can make to healing the flaws in consciousness and helping the world. Unkindness comes out of certainty; when we throw out certainty, we have the bare reality of consciousness, and another name for that is love.”

Saturday, June 19, 2010
We Wuz Robbed!

The move to Asheville NC has been a blessing. We are living about 6 miles up the road from my grandson, 20 minutes from my daughter and a half mile from Windhorse Zen Center. Attached is the view from our deck. We eat most of our meals there.

Last thursday afternoon we were the subject of brazen daylight break-in. The thief stole both my Mac computers, a sound system, and all my RX meds. In loss there is gain however, so I'm composing this on a sexy new iMac purchased with insurance money.

July 21, 2010
Uh-oh!

Four weeks ago I was doing splendidly. Walking two miles a day. Regaining physical strength. Planning to change the world with a cure for cancer.

We plan; God laughs. And God has sent me a real knee-slapper.

According to the physicians who have read my latest CT Scan, I have 4-6 weeks left to live. I'm currently at 75% renal failure. I have a mass in my intestines that is blocking normal functioning. I've gained 25 pounds of excess "water weight" that has caused my legs and ankles to swell. My hospice doctor predicts another Pulmonary Embolism in my future. Hah, hah, woo-hoo. That's a good one, God.

So how shall I spend my days?

I think I'll put together a schedule and follow it completely. Meditation and breakfast at Windhorse Zen Community, correspondence and phone calls, lunch with loved ones, watching our new puppy crawl all over Rocky the Dharma Dog. Napping in the cool mountain air. Holding and being held by Paula. Life is good. I vow to enjoy every last moment by being as fully present as possible. … I'm not in pain--thanks to the hospice program--they have the best drugs and nobody seems worried about me becoming addicted.

That's enough for tonight. Know that I'll sleep well tonight. That I'm not afraid. And that I love you all.

Koso

Thursday, July 22, 2010
I probably won’t last the week

Sorry friends, The end is coming much sooner than predicted. I won't horrify you with the graphic details; let's just say none of my plumbing is operational. I tried and tried to find a remedy that would allow me to make a farewell tour---even ordered t-shirts :-) All to no avail. I now have 24 hour nursing care which provides a nice break for Paula. …

Over the past decade, especially, it has been my honor to serve you in a spirit of mutuality. I learned lot.

I love you all,

Koso

Thursday, July 22, 2010
Please feel free to call

If you would like a chance to say good-bye before I transition, please give me a call. If you get my voicemail, leave a message. I would like to spend as much time as possible in these remaining days communicating with my friends, colleagues and clients. I used to joke that I would die with my headset on. Who knows? Maybe that will come true. LoL

Koso

July 27, 2010
It was like this

As his final entry, Phil posts the the poem by Jane Hirshfield, “It was Like This: You Were Happy.” We have excerpted the closing lines:

Your story was this: you were happy, then you were sad,
you slept, you awakened.
Sometimes you ate roasted chestnuts, sometimes persimmons.

About Phil Gable

Dove (Amy Lindsay-Joynt)

2011-01-21T09:52:00.004-06:00

About Amy Lindsay-Joynt

Every Grain of Sand (Keith Kachtick)

2011-01-21T09:51:00.004-06:00

Miami Beach is not a place you'd expect to stumble upon a gathering of Tibetan monks. But one New Year's Day several years ago, during the final weeks of a dissolving four-year marriage, I did just that. My wife and I had planned to fly to Miami from Manhattan—our five-day trip to warmer climes intended as a last-gasp attempt at reconciliation. But, long story short, I ended up spending the holidays in South Beach alone. Boy, was it depressing.

On the day I found the monks, I had barely eaten. After trudging for hours along the deserted dunes, bundled against a surprisingly chilly wind in a wool sweater and faded jeans, I peeked into a small community center on the beach near my crumbling art deco hotel. A sign above the entrance read "Enjoy Tibetan culture and art." Inside, six Buddhist lamas from a monastery in India huddled quietly over a six-by-six-foot platform. The monks were on day two of a weeklong project to create a sand mandala, a richly metaphorical depiction of the universe made of millions of grains of vibrantly colored sand.

I joined a handful of visitors seated in chairs arranged around the cordoned-off platform. Some guests closed their eyes. One silently chanted a mantra and thumbed her mala beads. Most of us were barefoot. The only noise came from the gentle crashing of the ocean waves, no more than 50 feet away, and the tiny stick each monk stroked over the grated surface of his chakpur, the metallic straw-like funnel through which he directed the brightly hued sand, grain by grain, onto the slowly blossoming mandala. One monk kept a fold of his maroon-and-saffron robe pulled over his mouth to prevent his breath from scattering the sand.

After a short while, I felt an unexpected calm wash over me; it was the first moment of genuine ease I'd had since first learning from my wife that she was considering a divorce. For months I'd been holding tight to broken promises and spending so much energy wishing things were different that I felt as though I'd forgotten how to breathe.

No Need to Panic

Sitting there, I recalled hearing that a spiritual journey is akin to falling from a plane without a parachute. Terrifying. And that's what my life felt like at the time. Like many other people, I sometimes desperately grasp for material comfort and cling to expectations for the future in a misguided attempt to stop the sensation of plummeting into oblivion. But watching the mandala unfold reminded me that panic is unnecessary because the parachute is unnecessary. Why? Because—as yoga teaches us—there's no ground to ever hit. We're all in perpetual free fall. One breath to the next. One exuberantly lived life to the next. The monks weren't going to preserve the intricate mandala for future generations; they were creating a symbol of the transitory nature of all things and would destroy the design almost as soon as it was complete. But the mandala was no less beautiful for its impermanence.

The monks' absolute mindfulness, punctuated by an occasional hushed comment or chuckle, proved both mesmerizing and deeply soothing. I stayed for more than three hours, until the center closed for the night. During that time, the monks never stretched their backs nor glanced at the clock. No matter how far they leaned over the table, they somehow never disturbed the sand. Despite a dozen arms stretching over the mandala, the effect of their collective work was a sense of profound stillness.

The proximity of the monks' delicate artwork to the briny mist and rolling whitecaps of the Atlantic Ocean reminded me of another unlikely shoreline meditation I once witnessed: the Santa Barbara Sandcastle Festival, held every summer on East Beach in Santa Barbara, California. From dawn until dusk, bare-shouldered teams equipped with buckets and rakes, melon scoops and putty knives, deliver wet sand to 16-by-16-foot plots to make enormous and impressively detailed sand sculptures, some as large as a mobile home. Past entries have included scaled replicas of the Taj Mahal and the Manhattan skyline, a 20-foot dolphin morphing into a mermaid, Hogwarts Castle, and an eerily realistic laughing buddha as rotund as a VW van.

While they're diligently working, the sand artists are intent, as if nothing in the world is more important than crafting their sculptures. And yet, at the end of the day, as the sun sinks beneath the horizon, the artists and their friends and families gather cross-legged on the dunes, sunburned and quietly exuberant, to watch without complaint as the tide washes their creations away.

Like the sand mandala, this event is for me an inspiring illustration of sunyata, a fundamental tenet of yoga. Sunyata, often translated from Sanskrit as "emptiness," is what Shiva, the Hindu god of destruction, represents: that everything eventually falls apart and becomes something else. This cosmic recycling dance is implicit in Shiva's jig-lifted leg, with which he's often depicted in Indian statues and paintings and in Natarajasana (Lord of the Dance Pose). Realizing sunyata's significance, not just intellectually but also experientially, is essential for becoming enlightened. For truly awakening.

Nothing Lasts Forever

Though it sounds paradoxical, sunyata is the core of what yoga and Buddhism generally affirm is a coreless reality. To fully understand yoga and Buddhism, you must not only recognize but also be OK with the fact that everything—every thing—is a sandcastle, and that material stuff, any compounded phenomenon, sooner or later falls apart and washes away with the tide. This magazine is a sandcastle.
My marriage is a sandcastle. So too are the yoga studio I own, the bike that gets me there, the century-old pecan tree in my backyard—even my achy but faithful body. I find this a sobering and empowering truth, and it leads to some compelling questions: Who am I really? What am I? And what, if anything, actually dies?

In Miami I began to more fully appreciate that moving toward enlightenment means, in large part, knowing that the wisest way to hold something (or someone) is with an open palm. William Blake understood sunyata when he wrote,

He who binds to himself a joy Does the winged life destroy; But he who kisses the joy as it flies Lives in eternity's sunrise.

The challenge—and it's a challenge that can separate enlightened behavior from unenlightened—is to love the sandcastle no less for its transitory nature. To treat each precious moment as if it's the most important thing in the universe, while also knowing that it's no more important than the moment that comes next.

I returned to the Miami community center the following morning and sat alongside the Tibetan monks and their evolving sand mandala for much of the day. And the morning after that. Three days after my return to an empty Manhattan apartment, the six monks completed their work. What had made watching them hour after hour such a sweetly challenging meditation was my knowing from the start how it would end.

After a collective bow of respect, they'd brush their beautiful creation into a multi-colored heap, pour the heap into an urn, and empty the urn's contents into the ocean. Similarly, with a growing sense of peace, I gradually surrendered my dying relationship with my wife to the tidal pull of the cosmos.

About Keith Kathtik

Man in a Boat (Amy Lindsay-Joynt)

2011-01-21T09:48:00.002-06:00

About Amy Lindsay-Joynt

Our life is like a candle flame... (Rosan)

2011-01-21T09:43:00.004-06:00

Good morning!
The morning star is high in the sky clean and cool.

Before I came here I read emails and found one from
Brittany informing me of her grandmother passing away.

Our life is like a shooting star, suddenly appearing and
disappearing. Once appearing anything must disappear
like a tree sprouting and decaying. When compared with
a tree which can live hundreds or thousands years, our
life is brief and brittle. Compared with a star, our life is
like that of a firefly, small and dim.

Our life is like a candle flame, bright or dark, long or
short, blown off by wind or burning itself and others…
Our karma makes birth and death, great or small,
brilliant or dismal…

We want to make our birth and death in truth, peace,
harmony and holiness. That’s why we practice in limitless
life, light, liberation and love.

Gassho,
Rosan

About Dr. Osamu Rosan Yoshida

Contributors for this Issue

2011-01-21T09:41:00.006-06:00

Dwayne Bohuslav is an architectural designer/installation artist/educator. He currently is an Assistant Professor teaching in the Architecture Program at San Antonio College. As a design instructor, he emphasizes community-based projects that focus on the needs for students to be meaningfully and directly engaged as stewards for their cities. Simultaneously he pursues an intensive artistic practice engaging unlikely sites with large-scale, temporary architectural installations often activated with the collaboration of students and performance artists. Over the past decade he has collaborated with his partner and spouse, Joanne Brigham, on site-specific performance installations in Texas and abroad. Dwayne regularly practices at the San Antonio Zen Center, where he currently serves as Ino. His website is http://www.movingbodies.org/artists.html

Phil Gable was Stagen’s most tenured coach and had been a professional communicator and educator in various fields for over three decades. His lifelong passion for communication led him first to advertising, then to mediation (he was a Certified Professional Mediator), and finally to coaching. He had over 25 years in the marketing communications field. He helped numerous blue chip firms achieve their marketing communications goals, including DuPont, Sun Information Services, Armstrong Floors, and Gore-Tex. As a Certified Professional Mediator, Phil logged hundreds of hours in the field and had developed a series of conflict resolution courses. Phil was also a second-degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do. For the past 12 years he studied and trained intensely in various monasteries and Zen centers around the country. In 2010 he was ordained as a Zen Priest at the Austin Zen Center.

Betty Gross has lived in every quadrant of this country, attended university in Florida and Maryland, and borne children in Boulder and Austin. She has worked as a bus driver, groundskeeper, and microbiology research technician. She studied Yoga in India. France, and Greece and has taught yoga for fourteen years in Austin. Her Buddhist study started with Chogam Trunpa Rimpoche, and she has studied Buddhism in Nepal and Tibet. She has been a member of AZC for many years.

Keith Katchtik is the director of Dharma Yoga, down the street from AZC. He served as instructor for the Lineage Project, a Buddhist nonprofit that offers meditation and yoga asana in New York City youth prisons. Before moving back to Austin, he taught at Bliss Yoga Center in Woodstock, was on the faculty of the Omega Institute, and led yoga and meditation retreats in Manhattan, Costa Rica, Mexico, and Italy. Keith's yoga classes in Austin combine elements of the Jivamukti and Anusara traditions. He is author of two books on Buddhism: Hungry Ghost and You Are Not Here & Other Works of Buddhist Fiction. Keith offers a deep bow of thanks to the inspirational teachings of Tias Little, John Friend, Lama Surya Das, and His Holiness the Dalai Lama, as well as to the wonderful Dharma Yoga sangha.

Brandon Lamson has practiced at the Houston Zen Center since 2005, and is a co-founder of the Houston Dharma Punx. He recently received his Ph.D. in Creative Writing and Literature from the University of Houston, and before moving to Houston he taught at various schools in New York City, including at an alternative school for inmates on Rikers Island. His poems and essays have appeared in various literary journals including Hunger Magazine, Brilliant Corners, and Joyce Studies Annual.

Amy Lindsay-Joynt has worked as a professional artist for many years. She writes, "The images are not planned but revealed through a process that begins with random marks. The end result is contingent upon what these random marks suggest. Often the works are landscapes, seascapes or inspired by a poem or story. Whatever the end result, the common denominator is that the image, its texture, its light are metaphors in a visual vocabulary that I have been developing for over 20 years. What I find interesting is not what they mean to me but what others see or how they respond.” See more of her paintings here: http://www.diversearts.org/DALG/events/EAST2009.AmyLindsay-Joynt.shtml

Kim Mosley, a co-editor of Just This, was born in Chicago in 1946. He lived, worked and taught at School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Bradley University, Southern Methodist University, Lindenwood University and St. Louis Community College (where he was also Dean of Liberal Arts). Kim received a photographer's fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts in 1981. His work is included in collections throughout the country including the Art Institute of Chicago, the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, and the Center for Creative Photography in Tucson. He now lives and works in Austin, TX. His blog, Diaristic Notations, has over 1300 posts of writing and art.

Vickie Schubert has lived in Central Texas her entire life, growing up in Niederwald, attending UT Austin, and living in Austin ever since. After a long career in accounting and finance she is now semi-retired and spends her days gardening, exercising, sitting, playing with her dog, and traveling. Vickie has been involved in contemplative Christianity for over 15 years and has attended the Austin Zen Center for slightly over a year. This work, as with most of her poetry, was inspired by the wonder that abounds in nature, the wonder that is always present, even when you aren’t.

Glen Snyder grew up in Washington state and in Michigan. He lived in Costa Rica for 14 years, first as a Peace Corps volunteer, then as a high school teacher. At present, he lives in Houston and works at Rice University as a geochemist. His research travels have taken him to many places, including Japan, Chile, Nicaragua, El Salvador, New Zealand, China, and Antarctica. Zen Practitioner and student of Setsuan Gaelyn Godwin, he is currently the Ino at the Houston Zen Center. Glen’s work page is: http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~gsnyder/

Dokan Rick Wadsworth, a former editor of Just This, is a member of San Antonio Zen Center. Rick describes himself as "an eclectic therapist utilizing a combination of behavioral, cognitive and emotive approaches to assist my clients in change and in experiencing happier lives." The poem came from his experience with his father in hospice.

Sarah Webb, a co-editor for Just This, is an English professor retired from the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma, where she is Poetry and Fiction editor for their magazine, Crosstimbers. Her teacher is Albert Low of the Montreal Zen Centre. She spends her winters tutoring ESL and writing and her summers traveling the West in her VW van. She walks along the lake in the evening with her rambunctious hound dog Rex.

Dr. Osamu Rosan Yoshida, founder and director of Missouri Zen Center, was ordained by Katagiri Dainin Roshi in 1989 and also by Tsugen Narasaki Roshi, after training at Zuioji Monastery under Tsugen Narasaki Roshi, et al, in 1990. He received his Ph.D. from Columbia Univ. and M.A. from Tokyo Univ. and taught philosophy, religion, global ethic, etc. at Washington Univ., Univ. of Nebraska, Toyo Univ., etc. He authored NO SELF—A Systematic Interpretation of Buddhism, Limitless Life—Dogen’s World, etc. and is active in participating in the Parliament of World’s Religions, etc. and promoting Global Ethic and peace, initiating Global System Ethic Association in Japan and Global System Ethic Society in the U.S.

Introduction: Zen Poetics (Sarah Webb)

2010-05-26T14:30:00.000-05:00

What is it about Zen and poetry? There are so many Buddhist poets, enough for anthologies dedicated just to them, and—despite the warnings against reliance on words and scriptures—poetry has come to seem a Zen artistic discipline, much like archery or calligraphy or tea. The sudden flashes we call haiku are a well known part of the Zen tradition, but Zen poets write in many forms, as we learned from Norman Fischer’s recent reading at AZC. Why is poetry so natural to Zen practitioners?

In writing poetry we are mindful, not of drying cloth on the plate or door knob turning but of the movement of our minds. Yes, we are square in the world of form, just as we are when we sit on our cushions or experience our steps in kinhin. But we see our thoughts arising from nowhere. They appear, they turn into a poem.

Long or short, multi-layered or spare, personal or detached, poetry does something other words cannot. It is a bridge into the unsayable. We quieten and listen, let ourselves be the ground in which the void spills into form. How intimate.

Unfolding (Vickie Schubert)

2010-05-26T14:20:00.004-05:00

I find myself
a precisely folded,
intricate, delicate,
beautiful orgami,
shaped as dove or maybe antelope,
it really doesn’t matter,
because I also notice
I am unfolding
so what once was antelope,
is now swan,
and now snake,
and now just paper,
beautiful, blank paper,
waiting to be refolded
by the universe
into a new shape,
or maybe waiting
for a more profound transformation,
slowly through deterioration,
or quickly through flame,
into the bare elements
of interbeing.
And maybe I will become
real dove or swan or antelope
or maybe just another piece
of beautiful blank paper.
It really doesn’t matter.

Drawing by Angela Rogers

Zen Poetics of Ryokan (Meng-hu)

2010-05-26T14:19:00.020-05:00

The following article (by Meng-hu) is reprinted from Simply Haiku: A Quarterly Journal of Japanese Short Form Poetry, Summer 2006, vol. 4., no. 2 (www.simplyhaiku.com). Reprinted with permission.

If the only measure of poetry were technique, then the haiku and waka of Ryokan (1758-1831) would not be models. But Ryokan scorned technique. His favorite predecessor was not a formal Japanese scholar-poet but Han-Shan, the Chinese hermit who inscribed his poems on rocks, walls and miscellaneous scraps, and boasted that his technical flaws ("wasp's waist" and "crane's knees") proved that he was neither a poet nor learned. Han-shan summed up ignorant reaction to his work:

When stupid people read my poems,
They don't understand and sneer.
When average people read my poems,
They reflect and say they are deep.
When gifted people read my poems,
They react with full-face grins.

Ryokan, too, disputed the academic version of what was proper poetry, lampooning the monk-poets of his day:

With gaudy words their lines are formed
And further adorned by novel and curious phrases.
Yet if they fail to express what is in their own minds
What is the use, no matter
How many poems they compose!

But he went further than Han-shan.

Who says my poems are poems?
My poems are not poems.
After you know my poems are not poems,
Then we can begin to discuss poetry!

If we are to learn from Ryokan, who is Japan's most famous and beloved poet, our premises about poetry must shift radically from technique to inspiration.

Zen philosophy

A Zen principle is squarely at work in Ryokan. It parallels Zen advice on meditation. For one does not wait to master the scriptures of Buddhism before starting to meditate, instead practicing right away in order to gain benefit as soon as possible. The benefit of meditation will transform and improve the self before any intellectual work will.

The same principle applies to poetry. Do not wait to master technique before grasping the essence of poetry and starting from there. What is this essence?

For Ryokan, poetry evidences life itself, but not as metaphor, memory, or contrived emotion. Poetry records the non-dual experience of life and consciousness. Ryokan's poetry transcends the distinctions between reflective mind and the objects of the mind’s awareness. As Ryokan says above of the monk-poets, poetry fails if it does not express what is in one's own mind. A poem must evidence the immediacy of thought and emotion, recorded in the fullness of spontaneity.

But a rough draft is not a finished poem. Sloppiness, lack of discipline or frivolousness is not spontaneity -- the spontaneity of the calligrapher's enso, the spontaneity of the archer. The key to Ryokan’s heartfelt poetry is Zen insight.

As a master calligrapher, Ryokan extended and interwove the visual and disciplinary aspects of this art with his poetry. Ryokan pushes individual creativity to its philosophical limits while fully expressing emotion and feeling, what is "in the mind." Just as in calligraphy, where the experience of emptiness inspires the perfect enso, so, too, is the perfect poem inspired by perfect self-awareness.

For Ryokan, the key is non-dualism.

Illusion and enlightenment? Two sides of a coin.
Universals and particulars? No difference.
All day I read the wordless sutra;
All night not a thought of Zen practice ...

As a hermit and wanderer, Ryokan clung to little, for he saw no differences between himself and all that was around him. His heart was prepared to embrace a moral sensibility: his identification with the bodhisattva way.

When you encounter those who are wicked, unrighteous, foolish, dim-witted, deformed, vicious, chronically ill, lonely, unfortunate, or disabled, you should think: "How can I save them?" And even if there is nothing you can do, at least you must not indulge in feelings of arrogance, superiority, derision, scorn, or abhorrence, but should immediately manifest sympathy and compassion. If you fail to do so, you should feel ashamed and deeply reproach yourself: "How far I have strayed from the Way! How can I betray the old sages? I take these words as an admonition to myself."

This moral sensibility enables Ryokan to withdraw from institutions and social activities, and to disdain social convention and the expectations of others. Nor is Ryokan intent on teaching or admonishing anybody.

The water of the valley stream
Never shouts at the tainted world: "Purify yourself!"
But naturally, as it is,
Shows how it is done.

His mendicancy, eremitism, and poetry are apiece with his view that the world is governed by vanity and ignorance. Ryokan, who was trained as a Zen monk, was imminently able to interweave these threads. Here are some compelling examples:

If someone asks what is the mark of enlightenment or illusion,
I cannot say -- wealth and honor are nothing but dust,
As the evening rain falls, I sit in my hermitage
And stretch out both feet in answer.

The ridicule or praise of worldly people means nothing
This is an old truth; don't think it was discovered recently.
"I want this, I want that"
Is nothing but foolishness.
I'll tell you a secret:
All things are impermanent.

I have nothing to report, my friends.
If you want to find the meaning,
Stop chasing after so many things.

Why do you so earnestly seek the truth in distant places?
Look for delusion and truth in the bottom of your own hearts.

Objects and images

Ryokan uses standard Japanese poetic evocations: the cry of autumn cicada, call of the hototogisu, the arrival of twilight over empty fields, the now-filled paths where no visitors will trod to his hut until spring. The poems present a catalog of everyday objects that reflect a realistic or naturalistic element. For the reader, each of the five senses is offered vivid objects, not mere metaphors. The mundane derives meaning from what has been reflected in Ryokan's mind. Here is a set of typical objects and their corresponding senses.

visual	river shimmering like silk
	trees white with peach blossoms
	fluttering sparrows
	flickering fire in a hearth
	glimpse of fireflies in the night
	books of poetry scattered on the floor
aural	monkey cries from a mountaintop
	far-off pounding of rice
	freezing rain at night
	village dogs baying at the moon
	cry of the hototoguisu
	frogs chanting in a pond
	cry of a deer to its mate
olfactory	dried leaves or wood chips burning slowly in a hearth
	fragrance of wild chrysanthemums or plum blossoms
	scent of cedar and pine carried by the wind
	an empty room filled with incense smoke
	a bowl fragrant from rice of a thousand offerings
taste	pure water from a temple well or spring
	freshly picked vegetables
	basket of fresh mushrooms
	seaweed of Nozomi
	winter greens
	weak tea and thin soup
	warm sakè
	taros in a pot with salty miso
tactile	night air fresh and cool; a cool breeze at the window
	old fingers mending a tattered robe
	robe moist with dew
	tossing a ball with village children
	shivering cold in an unheated hut

To make a poem, Ryokan now takes the objects in his mind (as in the above table) and runs them through his philosophical insight. The two aspects are interwoven by the unique personality and skills of the poet. Ryokan's religious sentiments are evident but subtle. His emotional expressions are heartfelt and, however subjective, they point beyond sorrow or loneliness to insight and wisdom.

Thus the poet does not have to tell us, for example, that he is melancholic. He shows us, through the combination of images and insights that reveal the state of his mind.

Sometimes Ryokan is direct in his philosophizing, while the images provide context:

The rain has stopped, the clouds have drifted away, and the weather is clear again.
If your heart is pure, then all things in your world are pure.
Abandon this fleeting world, abandon yourself,
Then the moon and flowers will guide you along the Way.

At other times, even the stolid hermit's reflections are melancholic:

I sit quietly, listening to the falling leaves--
A lonely hut, a life of renunciation.
The past has faded, things are no longer remembered.
My sleeve is wet with tears.

Conclusion

If poetry is to breathe vitality, to offer an authentic and passionate voice that is nevertheless insightful and reflective, then Ryokan is a preeminent model. True poetry, like life itself, presents the entirety of what is in the mind and heart.

Charting his personal path, Ryokan's poems mingle with nature's path, so that we, the reader, will come to understand their non-duality.

The village has disappeared in the evening mist
And the path is hard to follow.
Walking through the pines,
I return to my lonely hut.

URL of this page: http://www.hermitary.com/articles/ryokan_poetics.html
© 2006, the hermitary and Meng-hu

Notes to Self (Isshin Glen Snyder)

2010-05-26T14:19:00.018-05:00

Gasshou

notes to self on howto of zen and poetry writing

一

hold the ink brush loosely and near vertically and trace an invisible enso on the table top.

then collect loose papers from desk and all around apartment.

gently flatten out papers with palms of your hands and stack in a neat pile next to brush.

once stacking is completed, return brush back to storage place.

take papers out to recycle box.

二

sit upright on cushion in quiet place.

place left foot against right thigh.

if fatigued and troubled, don't struggle if you nod off.

notice brief dreams that are interrupted when lurching forward.

observe generosity by which stomach provides mind with gentle perceptions.

notice how stomach allows happy-busy mind stay happy-busy while stomach just sits.

let your mind be just as gentle to your mind as your stomach is to the rest of you.

三

set out three shoe boxes, nesting each in its own lid.

in middle box add old photographs, seashells, used ticket stubs, and travel souvenirs.

Gently mix contents and distribute between the other two boxes.

close boxes and notice if lids fit snugly.

if sunny, go outside barefoot on sidewalk.

glance downward and jump three times.

quickly observe if what the sidewalk reveals is a shadow of the tops of your feet.

or a reflection of the bottoms of your feet.

return at night and do the same thing.

observe any hesitation about someone else noticing.

四

sit with left foot crossed over right thigh.

lighten self as if the whole universe were glowing neon hotel vacancy signs.

allow all beings of ten directions and all three times to come and sit within sheltered realm of your hokkaijoin.

don't forget to allow self to sit within sheltered realm of your own mudra.

take note of where you are sitting.

五

share afternoon sun with green chameleon that lives in damp drainspout.

observe any stillness or motion.

after some time, observe if your own color has changed.

六

sit with right foot placed over left thigh,

let self be deep inside body of buddha on the altar.

observe sensations from crown of topknot down to toes of both feet.

sense lotus throne beneath and bodhisattvas at your side.

glance across the buddha hall by looking out both buddha-eyes

listen through long-lobed buddha-ears.

delight in all the altar offerings and make slight buddha-lipped smile.

take note if this feels at all like sacrilige.

八

drive i-45 southbound with the windows rolled down at a moment when things are both bright sunny and pouring down rain.

observe how the vehicle belonging to self maneuvers the fish school of other vehicles.

recall last time the pebble smacked the small star in windshield and observe the steam rising off hot freeway.

recall all poets no longer alive, not omitting those alive right now and those not yet born..

between each pass of the wipers, observe on windshield the intensity of raindrops like inkdrop kanji.

observe any similar kanji strokes repeated in tears running down cheeks.

take note of any concerns about upholstery getting wet.

九

sit with left foot resting on right thigh through early morning hours.

experience each occasional dog-bark, grackle-caw, radio salsa car-passing, leaf-rustle with equal intensity as an inseparable part of self while still being uniquely individual.

on another morning during a thunderstorm, see if each individual raindrop can be viewed with the same such equanimity, as it splatters on rooftops, sidewalks and lawns or as it leaps under whispering car tires,

notice sounds and smells when the drops merge and soak into the ground.

十

once home and before going to bed

arrange living space as if you might awaken in a void of perfect darkness with no light switches or street lights.

before turning out lights, take careful note of where things are so you might comfortably maneuver through personal belongings without groping around, grasping, or pushing away.

once morning arrives, promptly forget that you had arranged anything.

Attention (Thomas Turner)

2010-05-26T14:18:00.004-05:00

i forgot i wrote this one....it was in aspen. a few years ago
and i dont believe in a process. they come out. like the breath. maybe i scratch out a word. then im done with them.

the evening
I sat in wet grass
starlight dusted
my hair.

and i remember
brushing back
the mycelia
of the heavens
with my concentration.

attention
attention
attention

and yet,
the twinkle
remains.

-daigu

No Zen in Haiku (Trevor Maloney)

2010-05-26T14:17:00.003-05:00

Some folks think that haiku has everything to do with Zen; a famous Indian teacher even said that haiku are poems that Zen priests use to express their enlightenment experiences. But, fortunately for us, this isn't true. Anybody who really wants to can write a haiku. In fact, here in the States and in Japan, anybody does write haiku. Normal slobs like you and me. Sure, the religion of Zen and Japanese artistic expressions share some interplay, but you don't have to be a Zen practitioner to write a decent haiku, and you definitely don't need to have any kind of Zen-ish glimpse of enlightenment. I started studying haiku in the Fall of 2007. Why haiku? Because I'm lazy, I think. You can write three lines - or even two - and then sometimes you're done. Tah dah! The instant coffee of poetry. Almost. The more you get into it, the more you'll want to refine it. I've spent weeks refining eight to ten words, only to come back to it months later. Sometimes I get the same feeling working on a haiku as I do when I clean out an incensor, picking out the little stubs; So, this is what my life is reduced to, huh? It's all come down to this...

ice skating with friends
watching children
fall

Around the Spring of 2008, I put 84 of my better haiku together in a little book called "Too Bright to See." I made and gave away about 300 copies to friends, family, sangha members, acquaintances, and a few strangers. This project remains one of the most rewarding things I've ever done. Knowing what I know now about haiku, I'd say there might be eight verses in "Too Bright to See" that are really within the tradition of haiku, and probably three of them are quite good. You have to start somewhere, I suppose.

went to the bay
to see some boats
alone with the fog

A young fellow at SFZC asked me, "Trevor, would you say that your practice of Zen informs your poetry?" "No," I answered, "I would never say that." He was surprised, "Really, why not?" "Because I think that would sound pretentious. Besides, I'm only getting started on the Zen thing. And I don't write poetry." Now, though, I would say that I want my Zen practice to inform my haiku writing, but no more than I want it to inform every aspect of my life.

small Texas towns
get bigger
final descent

(Visit Trevor's blog at: http://thebigoldoaktree.blogspot.com)

Farmer, Nebula, Plow (Sarah Webb)

2010-05-26T14:04:00.008-05:00

Some of the poems that come to me might be called Zen in content. Others bubble up from the muddy swamp of my life, and their mucky origins show. But they all emerge from that place I can’t see into. I can only allow the poem to come, not make it.

My teacher reminds his students, “The more you chase it, the more it runs away.” But if you sit listless and dead, you’ll never escape that dark cave. You can exert your will (and your monkey ego) and wriggle hard to see the truth. Or you can turn away, say to heck with it, what’s to see.

Neither approach will lead to awakening.Writing a poem—or rather, allowing a poem to arise--hints at a way out of that dilemma. You listen inside, you let words come. You don’t know where the poem will go, what it might mean. Maybe it doesn’t even make sense to you. But you have faith that the poem will write and something emerge.

How to go forward? My teacher has asked me to write a poem without words. I get grabby, I get discouraged and dead. I try to remember writing a poem.

The farmer plows his fields,
rye grass and oat,
and beneath him,
all the deep of hillside,
lies a great whorl,
dragon.

Plow scratches soil
as thin as egg shell

over snail spiral,
body of nebula

and the red nebula heart,
a sun even the farmer feels.

He looks at the day,
at the bird startling up from grass
and longs--

for what?
the earth crumbling away from the plow blade,
the bob of seedhead,
the way his hand pulls at the rein?

Oh, it is very close--
something he almost knows,
rose fire in his chest.
a tremble like earth shifting,
he can almost say it.

Q&A, Poem (Norman Fischer)

2010-05-26T14:03:00.002-05:00

JustThis: How do you turn your practice of poetry towards liberation?

NF: as far as i am concerned poetry is already liberation, i don't have to turn it anyhow. writing is not about me- i can't be attached to it or self centered about it, i have to let go and let the writing write itself. so writing is practice by other means. not so different from sitting, really, or anything else.

The simplest way
Is the way, the next movement
Is that moment
Without scorn
Into the tappet

Seal Mummy Haiku (Isshin Glen Snyder)

2010-05-26T14:02:00.003-05:00

No cut-words. “Oh!”, “Ah!”...not quite. No season-words to speak of. I suppose Texas redbud blossoms are more obvious than the ripple marks of a mallard landing in the still lake waters...but perhaps never subtle enough. Brushstrokes and keystrokes will never be the same object as that of our sensations, perceptions, formations, and mind-consciousness. Our visions and words can form only letters on paper or electronic ether ASCII....symbols that will never themselves form the pictographs of our own expressions. Faced with such limitations, it's amazing we can even attempt haiku at all....or even some semblance of haiku...or even something that is not haiku at all but which we call haiku. And I wish I had the freedom of Kerouak, great unrecognized haiku patriarch of the west who, once freed of the encumbrances of 5-7-5, was able to pencil out each day's dharma pops in a small spiral notebook. But here I am again, no further along than 5-7-5. If I miss a beat, someone will surely tell me. Sitting in a circle sharing poetry of a single breath. Haiku is haiku. And haiku is not haiku. Then haiku is haiku. It is at once me...and I am not it!

between east and west
antarctic ice sheets,
martian desert walk.

talus valley walls.
thick brine of reflections bursts
forth red algal bloom.

a glacier that cares to
neither advance nor retreat:
wall unto itself.

way far upvalley
landlocked visions of wind sounds
turn like weather vanes.

seal mummy silence:
empty pharaoh visions hail
the cold continent.

flesh ablates away
the adiabatic winds
of austral summer light.

Isshin Glen Snyder lived for 6 weeks in the Antarctica during the 2005-2006 research season, where he carried out NSF-sponsored research on the Dry Valleys Lakes. When he returned, he began to study Zen.

Lotuses (Brandon Lamson)

2010-05-26T14:01:00.005-05:00

Late May in Houston: already, a fog of ninety degree heat washes over the city like a kind of primordial soup, a viscous haze we swim through. My second wedding anniversary several weeks away, I remember our elopement to the Dulcinea Chapel perched in the hills outside Austin, a view of scrub brush and the domed rooftops of an ashram unfurling below as we said our vows. The day before, walking down to the river from the San Jose Hotel, we strolled by a pond of lotuses, dozens of them opening to the sunlight, their pink and white petals absorbing the reflections of drifting clouds.

In Buddhist texts the lotus is a symbol of enlightenment: rooted in the mud of human suffering, it extends toward the light of awareness, reaching its full expression in the union of heaven and earth. This movement is not linear but cyclical; soon after it blossoms, the lotus sprays seeds that sink below the surface and are rooted in the same mud the mature flower arose from, just as Bodhisattvas vow to return through countless lives until all sentient beings are liberated. In this sense, the lotus embodies our highest aspirations to fully become ourselves for the sake of others, to reap the merit of our practice and then give it away. What a beautiful metaphor for the delicate and mysterious unfolding of marriage, a dance with one leg in Samsara and the other in Nirvana, separation and togetherness entwined.

The poem “Lotuses” begins with this image of lovers tangled in bed, in the mud of their conjugal sheets. Threads of the secular and the sensual are interwoven throughout as the speaker meditates on the futility of separating these powerful strands, of cleaving “war” from “horses.” I thought of the lotus’s lack of discrimination, what Thich Nhat Hanh refers to as the interbeing of roses and garbage, the rich compost of our practice lives. And I considered the temptation to analyze, which comes from a Greek root word that means to break apart. Since my wife and I eloped five months after we met, it would be easy to simplify my understanding of this event either through the lens of romanticism and the fate of star-crossed lovers, or the lens of personal and family history, but the truth of our marriage is a dharma greater than these reductive views. Boundless, compassionate, mysteriously co-arising, it cannot be grasped. “Lotuses” ends with an ascension, a rising movement that does not seek to attain or to possess, but to enact a moment of awakening.

photos by Linda Mosley of her St. Louis lotuses (2005)

Lotuses

I wake cold and happy, not caring she’s taken the sheets
from me at night and they ravel around her, the freckle below
her right breast close to my lips.

I haven’t spoken yet, though if I could and breath
was perfectly distilled vision then I could conjure
her as she is, her leg across my hip, winding around me

as though I were the length of her spine, a shaft of bamboo.
Lotus plants root in mud, the resinous, binding force
that lowers consciousness to rage and lust, siphoning

these poisons into vibrant magentas. Startling
this immersion in another’s heat and light, and these
lotuses tinged pink, each a fragrant cloud.

We may dissemble the animal and divine,
cleave war from horses, but then our source
of greatness, would diminish, our soul no longer yoked

to the dirt of human empathy where blood
worms writhe in paper cups of soil
and are threaded onto hooks cast beneath the water

where our beloved cannot follow
and we must take our time ascending
through the foundation below, into the space

beneath the bed, through scuffed floorboards
and box springs, through layers of mattress and
into troubled flesh that opens its ragged mouths.

Entering the Meditation Hall (Brianna Walther)

2010-05-26T14:00:00.002-05:00

I often write haiku as a warm-up exercise before working with longer written forms, and as a way of staying connected with my meditation practice.

I enter
the meditation
hall and bow

I offer
a silent prayer
and sit

a bell sounds
the roar of silence
begins now

He held a piece
of paper 'tween
his thumbs gently.
–Kim Mosley

Sunyata (Sherry Priest)

2010-05-26T13:59:00.002-05:00

Like everything I write, the poem is based on actual events in my life and was "triggered" by a conversation with a young woman who was pregnant with her first child. (Sherry Priest on the writing to "Sunyata")

Sunyata
Last week St. Bridget’s Day,
Fire and straw woven into crosses.
Ash Wednesday coming soon,
The last rite of the Church I could receive.
Holding my baby,
Ashes on his innocent forehead,
Black dust
Across the bridge of his nose
The truth plain.
Dust thou art and to dust thou shall return
No need to attach to sin,
No need to be redeemed.
The five skandhas are sunyata.
Feeling thought volition and consciousness likewise are like this.
Dust.
A wedding on Good Saturday.
I will bring a bottle of wine
And a brightly colored egg
For my friend the groom.
I will bottle my own vinegar for this day,
Whisper in his ear only that
I wish for them lots of fat babies
For me to play with
And then give back.
My babies now weave fire and straw
On their own.
So young a woman,
Carrying her first
Soon giving birth,
Says she feels too big.
Not at peace with her swollen belly
She does not yet understand
How big the work she does
She does not yet know
She is the vessel of creation.
And only the vessel.
Empty.

Sunyata.

Copyright Sherry Priest 2007

Author’s Notes

Sunyata – Sanskrit term for Buddhist concept, often translated as “emptiness” or “lack of permanence.”

St. Bridget’s Day – February first. St. Bridget is a patron Saint of Ireland, also of babies and midwifes, and linked to a Celtic goddess of fertility and fire associated with Imbolc. St. Bridget’s crosses are woven of rushes and sometimes burned to protect homes from fire.

Dust thou art and to dust thou shall return–From the liturgy for Ash Wednesday

The five skandhas are sunyata.

Feeling thought volition and consciousness likewise are like this–From the Heart Sutra

Skandha – Sanskrit term for Buddhist concept, often translated as “aggregate” or “heap;” usually refers to the five elements of self, i.e., form, feeling, thought, volition, and consciousness.

lots of fat babies – A line from Firefly

This Love (Phil Gable)

2010-05-26T11:00:00.002-05:00

I wrote this poem in my head during a sitting period at sesshin. During a break I went to my car and wrote it down on a piece of scrap paper. It is the unedited, unrevised spontaneous product of my zen experience.

I’m a little reluctant to add more commentary because shikantaza isn’t about writing poems, yet when they arise, why not? I guess the poem is a rough expression or channeling of non-dual consciousness. I’ve found over the years that kensho moments defy conventional language because conventional language is intrinsically dualistic. That’s why the language of poetry and metaphor, story and art seem to serve better when the time comes that we have to say something.

This Love

The rose loves the compost
Arises from it, is nourished by it, returns to it.

But that is not this love.

This love arises from Nothing. Returns to Nothing.
This love depends on Nothing.
This love simply re-blooms, recreates, in each budding moment.

The ship loves the sea
Sails from port to port, buoyed by it, rocked by it,
Is tempered by its storms
And learns patience when the winds die away.

But that is not this love.

This love neither arises nor departs
Neither rages nor becalms
This love has no horizon
Rather, it sits steadfast like a beacon
Illuminating all who open their eyes to see.

The leaf loves the tree. Receives life from it,
Breathes life back, then dies, and in falling near the roots,
Provides the very last shred of its being
To sustain the cycle.

But that is not this love.

This love’s every breath is first and last.
This love was never born and so cannot die.

This love is a boundless field
That is not rose, nor ship, nor leaf
Yet holds them all and is held by them.

This love has no edges, no lines, no conditions.
This love is not two. Not you and me.

This love endures moment into moment
Lifetime into lifetime. Forever.

This love is just this: Love.

Last Night's Wedding (Kim Mosley)

2010-05-26T10:59:00.002-05:00

Forces join, wondering how

they could ever

be separate.

Families join, once not knowing

each other,

and now,

not knowing how

they could have not.

The passed elder says,

three things are important—

health, happiness, and

long life.

All guaranteed to be

curtailed, someday,

but for now,

for yesterday, and today,

we have all three,

many times over.

For today, over and

over and over again.

Introduction: Play (Rev. Trevor Maloney)

2010-03-17T19:46:00.006-05:00

For good reason, our Zen tradition is known for being a little serious, perhaps even harsh. The kyosaku is meant to help practitioners stay awake—and it does—but it still looks like someone getting hit with a stick. Linji was known for his deafening shout, and Te Shan for his tendency to beat his students with a staff. Our ancestors often remind us to be single-minded in our pursuit of truth. With death as our constant companion, what room is there for play, for goofing around?

You could easily focus on the dignity, majesty, and life-or-death seriousness of our tradition, if you wanted to. But, you would be forgetting Chin Niu, who would call his monks to lunch by beating a pot, laughing, dancing, and singing, "Bodhisattvas! Come and eat!" You would be forgetting the spontaneous laughter that came about at moments of awakening. You would be ignoring the Pang family's teasing each other as they sharpened their understanding together.

While buddhas and bodhisattvas are traditionally depicted with a slight smile, or at least a rather warm expression, Bodhidharma, the first Zen ancestor in China, sits there scowling. He's a scary sight. His beard is scraggly. He wears his robe over his head, which gives me the impression that he's hiding, that he doesn't want to talk to me. He probably wouldn't want to talk to me, in fact. He brought a teaching "not dependent on words and letters." Hui-Ke had to cut off his own hand just to get into his dokusan room. Bodhidharma was so dead serious and intent on practicing zazen, the legend says, that he sliced off his eyelids to keep from dozing off. (Fortunately for us, his eyelids fell to the ground and a tea plant sprung up, so we can just have some tea to stay alert.) Google image-search "Bodhidharma" and you'll see some serious-looking faces. Our way is difficult, he seems to say, demanding everything. Don't slack off.

This image is different, however. Hanging in the AZC zendo, it shows Bodhidharma playing with a chubby little kitty, and smiling. I've never seen such a depiction of the blue-eyed barbarian. Sure, practice hard, it seems to say, but know that this is all for the sake of liberation. Dogen tells us that if you realize that your mind is unlimited, "your priorities about everything change immediately." Maybe playing with the cat, or tying a pretty red ribbon around his neck, becomes the most important thing. Devote yourself wholeheartedly to this way that directly points to the absolute. Know that your mind is unlimited. Smile. Bodhidharma wants to play.

(Visit Trevor's blog at: http://thebigoldoaktree.blogspot.com/)

Remembering Play (Kim Mosley)

2010-03-17T19:43:00.004-05:00

We sat two periods of zazen today, during which time there were a few kids playing in the yard next to the zendo. At first I was annoyed, because I was having my private conversations with myself, and these kids were interrupting me. Then I started to sense it was me, 55 years ago, playing, not them. I moved from the cushion to the outdoors. I realized I was existing in two "time zones" at the same time. Later, after sitting, I saw the kids through the window. They had red shirts on. No, I thought. I wasn't wearing a red shirt that day!

(more of Kim Mosley's art can be found on his blog: mrkimmosleywrite.blogspot.com)

(daigu)

2010-03-17T19:40:00.001-05:00

nine bows
for the bodhisattva
child's play
the thus come one's
true disciple
who teaches children
the games
they know
by heart.

nine bows for bodhichitta,
freeze tag
hide & seek
and the immutable law
of hop scotch
jacks
jump rope
and the fool's favorite
peek-a-boo.

with closed eyes,
I see you.

play at work, work at play (Kim Mosley)

2010-03-17T19:37:00.004-05:00

Sometimes we mistakenly believe that kids play and adults work, but one just needs to watch a toddler and see how dedicated they are to the task at hand to realize they are learning about their universe in record time and will not (or rarely, as in Jasper's case below) be led astray by any distractions.

Adults, on the other hand, with their great understanding of the world, seem to have lots of time for play—sports, movies, and candlelight dinners.

QUESTION: AT WHAT AGE DO HUMANS PLAY? WHY?

(more of Kim Mosley's art can be found on his blog: mrkimmosleywrite.blogspot.com)

Daylight Savings (Cristina Mauro)

2010-03-17T19:28:00.002-05:00

Flung across their row of beds
my three boys fell asleep playing.

One lays diagonal across the mattress
chin propped up and arms outstretched.

A small blue airplane in one hand waits
to fly through the line of light beaming

from the flashlight in his other hand.

His twin brother has his head nested on the pillow
and arms down by his sides

but the covers are rumpled
and the headband circled twice around his upper arm

seems to suggest he has unusual powers.

The youngest sleeps upside down
with a red flip flop clinging to one foot.

His stuffed rabbit is not in the usual place
and his hand hangs over the mattress edge

holding a single sheet of blank paper.

The hour that vanished hangs over them and waits.

2005 Summer Intensive

2010-03-17T19:25:00.001-05:00

One hot day during Summer Intensive 2005, four participants (Nancy Webber, Anita Swan, Lila Parrish, Pat Yingst), crazed by the relentless chirping of cicadas and the unceasing watching of their thoughts, unleashed their impulses on the building and grounds of the AZC. Their mayhem did not go un-recorded! See it here.

The Ballad of Bodhidharma (John Grimes)

2010-03-17T19:22:00.002-05:00

Bodhidharma went to China
Just to see what he could see.
When he got there all he said is:
"What will be is what will be.
But delusion mars your vision
Of what is and what has been,
So just sit right down and turn around
And start to practice zen."

"Once you're seated and you're settled
Then you focus on your breath.
In good time it will be obvious
That twixt now and certain death
There's no you, no I, no me, no thee,
He, she, her, it or him.
There's just us, right here, and us, right now.
There is no they or them."

"All appearance is delusion
There is nothing there at all.
But do not activate your mind
When that nothing comes to call.
In the mind, no coughing, sighing
When you hate or when you crave.
There's no gain or loss – don't laugh or cry –
Come join me in my cave!"

Bodhidharma barks and snaps and snarls
And bristles in your face,
Yet he'd love a kiss and cuddle
Any time, most any place.
He's a puzzle, is our Bodhi,
As we struggle to perceive
That the only dharm' of karma is
We get what we receive.

(This can also be sung to the tune of the final rondo of The Elixir of Love by Donizetti)

Showdown at the Genjo Corral (Peg Syverson)

2010-03-17T19:19:00.002-05:00

Austin Zen Center 2003 Summer Intensive
Cast: Dogen, Billy (the kid), Bartender, Wyatt, Shane

Scene: A West Texas saloon, Showdown at the Genjo Corral

The arrival:
[Wyatt, Shane and Billy, seated at the table with a go game between Wyatt and Shane]
[Bartender is wiping off the bar when the robed stranger, Dogen, enters, carrying a set of oryoki bowls and a fan.]
Bartender: What can I do for ye, stranger?
Dogen: Nothing.
Bartender [sets down a shot glass]: Well, what’ll it be?
Dogen: Nothing.
Bartender rolls his eyes and takes away the glass.
Bartender: I guess you’re not from around these parts. So, then, what do you think of West Texas, pardner?
Dogen: As my great granddaddy said, “Vast emptiness, nothing holy.”

The gamblers:
Wyatt: You got that right, stranger. Say, what’s your handle?
Dogen: Dogen
Shane: Why don’t you come along, little dogie, and set right here by me.
[Dogen moves to the table and takes a seat next to Billy]
Wyatt: We’re just having a friendly game of Go with a little wager on the side. Table stakes, nothing much.
Billy [eagerly]: What are you gonna bet, Dogen?
Dogen: Nothing.

The teachings:

On self:
Wyatt: Well, then, what have you got to say for yourself?
Dogen: To study the Buddha way is to study the self;
Billy [helpfully]: Well, if you want to know the way to Buda, it’s a five day ride due east of here.
Wyatt: Hold on, Billy, let the man say his piece. [turns with interest to Dogen]
Dogen:To study the self is to forget the self.
Shane: well, now, Dogie, would that be the ontological self or the psychological self?
[chuckles]
Dogen: To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things.
Wyatt: Hell, talkin’ about myriad things, I got a lot on my plate too. My to-do list is a mile long. But what the Sam Hill are you talking about?
Dogen: When actualized by myriad things, your body and mind as well as the bodies and minds of others drop away.
Billy [excitedly]: You mean, like a lynching?
Dogen: No trace of realization remains, and this no-trace continues endlessly.
Wyatt: What??? Now you’re talking like a crazy man, ain’t he, Shane?

Form and emptiness:
Shane: Wait a minute, Wyatt. I think the man’s actualizing some fundamental point. Lookee here. See that corral? It’s form, and emptiness. Without the fence posts and rails, you got no corral, without the emptiness, you just got you a pile of lumber, and no place to put the herd.
Wyatt (triumphantly) : But supposin’ you was to turn them posts and rails into firewood and burn ‘em up? Then where’s your dadgummed corral, eh?
Dogen: Firewood becomes ash, and it does not become firewood again.
Shane (ruefully): He’s got you there, Wyatt.

The wind
Shane: Wind’s kickin’ up again.
Wyatt [shaking the head]: Like always. And it gets into everything. No point in even fanning yourself.
Dogen: Although you understand that the nature of the wind is permanent, you do not understand the meaning of its reaching everywhere.
Wyatt [annoyed]: Goddamned if I don’t, and I’ve got the sand in my ass to prove it.
Billy: What do you mean, Dogen?
Dogen (fans himself with his fan)

Dogen: It’s possible to illustrate this with more analogies, with birds, and fish, and boats, and so on... but I won’t. The moon is on the dewdrops, farewell, bodhisattvas-mahasattva.
Wyatt [narrowing the eyes]: What did you just call us, son?
Shane: Git along, little Dogie. I’ll enlighten this one.

Exit:
[Shane and Wyatt return to their go game, murmuring and shaking their heads, Billy looks on, and the bartender wipes down the bar.]
Wyatt: Another sake, Bartender!
Dogen, leaving [thoughtfully]: When buddhas are truly buddhas they do not necessarily notice that they are buddhas.

Play Full Out (Dosho Port)

2010-03-17T19:16:00.002-05:00

Dogen Zenji says, To listen to dharma is to cause your consciousness to play freely. This play is not a means but an end in itself. At that time you can have full commitment to play. The power to transform our life is from just playing with wholeheartedness. Naturally, you can play freely within practice. In the process of doing zazen, you can play freely with zazen and produce a new creative life. – Katagiri Roshi

I work in a school for teenagers in a large metropolitan district. Of course, like young people everywhere, they love to play. After a recent break, I asked a student how it was for him. He thought for a long moment and then said, “Well, I’d have to say good.”

“What about it was good?” I asked. After another reflective pause he said in seriousness, “Well, I didn’t get shot this time.”

This young man is not alone. I see many young people whose lives have been shaped by violence, who have gunshot or knife wounds, some of them sport several such urban battle scars with pride. Almost all of them have close relatives in prison.

These young people reflect the larger culture as it appears through popular movies to computer games, a culture increasingly permeated by violence and its glorification. Many of us have become increasingly numb or oblivious to violence, tolerating more and more of the intolerable.

The popularity of violence might be due to how easy and cheap it is to get people’s attention with violence—a lazy way that leaves us yearning for more in the hope that then we might feel alive, like potato chips and their greasy, saltiness that don’t satisfy hunger but leave us wanting more.

What’s this got to do with play?

In my view, the potential of Zen isn’t limited to giving aging boomers something to do in their upper middle years, nor is it about meeting any individual’s need for spiritual trips.

“The wind of Buddhadharma makes manifest the great earth’s gold,” said Dogen. In other words, Zen is about freshly addressing the key issues of our times and encouraging us to assertively make a Buddha out of a mud-ball life.

One of our primary issues, perhaps the challenge for our time, as Thich Nhat Han has long argued, is to make peace fun and interesting. Our survival may depend on it. Soto Zen, I suggest, is a practice of playing full out that offers one challenging way in which we can live a creative and deeply fulfilling life, doing what needs to be done with this precious opportunity of human birth.

Such a Zen has the potential to become a social movement, making playing together with all our hearts in all that we do the society's central organizing principle and our life’s most passionate engagement.

Frequently Dogen emphasizes this point. For example, in “Fukanzazengi” he says, “If you concentrate your effort single-mindedly, that in itself is wholeheartedly engaging the Way.”

And above you’ll find Katagiri Roshi’s comment on Dogen’s word, yuge, transforming through play. “This play is not a means but an end in itself. At that time you can have full commitment to play. The power to transform our life is from just playing with wholeheartedness.”

Yuge comprises the root of the name of our little practice place here in White Bear Township, Minnesota Yugeji, or Transforming Through Play Temple. Our most important guideline is to play full out.

By dropping the cowboy tendency to drift into our individual trips and our hungry ghost tendency to wallow in Zen-group-think blather, we are compelled to balance on a tight rope, on a razor’s edge of dynamic aliveness. This is the life vein of vividly hopping along together in this great life.

It certainly beats getting shot.

(Editor's note: Dosho Port is a priest in Katagiri Roshi's lineage who teaches in Minnesota, author of Keep Me in Your Heart a While. Visit his blog: http://wildfoxzen.blogspot.com/)

Playing (Jeffrey Burnaugh)

2010-03-17T19:13:00.002-05:00

Dog Friends (Sarah Webb)

2010-03-17T19:10:00.002-05:00

My dog Rex, a big hound dog blue heeler mix, just one year old, loves it when I take him to the lake shore in the late afternoon. The lake is down so there are acres for him to run on, and there’s water to splash through and birds to chase. He run almost out of sight, then thunders back and swerves as he gets to me, grinning with loopy joy. That’s a way to be, I think, grinning back. Not the only way but a good way—charging forward, full heartedly, feeling your joy.

Rex running on the shore

Kids can be like that too—full hearted. Sometimes with joy, sometimes screaming their rage or sorrow. They run and stumble and leap right back up so they can keep on playing.

That’s another way Rex is like a kid. He loves to play. About a month ago he met another dog along the shore, a furry-coated little beast about half Rex’s size. He reminds me of Missy, my last dog, who died last summer, but this dog is bigger and much healthier.

After a few minutes of bristling, he realized Rex wanted to play, and they started to chase each other. We meet him almost every day now, and the two of them chase and tumble and nip and wrestle.

Kids will find the possibilities in a situation. A table? They’ll sit at it, sit on it, crawl under it, tip it on its side, slide things down it, put a blanket over it, lie underneath it and look up.

That’s what these dogs do too. Each day they find a new game. One will hide down in a hollow and burst out to surprise the other. They’ll chew down sticks from the dried brush and tug-a-war with them. They’ll steal the sticks from each other and race through the open with the other one in chase.

They leap into the ponds and splash about. They take a stick and trot together.

Yesterday we went further down the shore into heavy brush and they barreled through the brush in circles, apparently just for the joy of crashing about and following the leader. When they’re exhausted—and it takes a lot to exhaust them—they’ll lie on each other in a heap and pant. Then Rex will leap up and off they go again.

There’s something about playing. Children play and dogs too, but so do many other creatures. Ravens do daredevil acrobats. Bear cubs wrestle and tumble. Lambs leap and run. Watching the dogs I see that it’s more than delight in motion. There’s a make-believe to it, as there is in children’s play. I’ll pretend to be angry and chase you and steal from you, but we know it’s not for real. We act like we’re separate and hostile, but we know we’re not at all. Instead we are making something together, a game.

Are we one or are we two? the dogs ask, and their game says, one. One, and a one that is bursting out into creation, making not just this world but pretend worlds and painting worlds and hitting balls and catching them worlds, and for dogs, chasing and splashing and tumbling worlds. A one that has inherent in it, play.

Playing in Prison (Lila Parrish)

2010-03-17T19:07:00.002-05:00

Play shows up with surprising gifts sometimes. I volunteer at the state prison in Lockhart as part of Inside Meditation, the prison program that AZC is part of. The class I teach is on meditation and occasionally I share some circle dance as part of that. When the women come into the classroom and sit down they are carrying the energy of living in large “pods” or units and sharing a cell with another woman. There is no privacy and even smiling at someone can get them in trouble at times. As a result of that environment many of them have guarded faces. The circle dances are lively and the novelty of dancing brings down that guardedness. Their faces light up with laughter and the delight of moving safely and playfully together. When a dance ends I invite them to look around the circle and notice the difference in how their faces look. Next I ask them to share anything they would like. “I forgot I was in prison while I was dancing.” “I felt like a child playing.” Our dancing together can give some moments of freedom and of remembering a younger, happier self. Gifts of freedom and youthful energy for at least two women. And for me the gift of deep gratitude for their willingness to dance and play with me.

March 2010

Play (Sarah Weintraub)

2010-03-17T19:04:00.002-05:00

It is not sunny. Pieces of a to-do list keep bursting into my head and making me stand there thinking, instead of moving into the next yoga pose. I could’ve gotten up earlier today, really. And then gotten out of bed sooner, actually. We are out of milk, and everything, because my roommate didn’t go grocery shopping. And she is the easiest person in the world to live with, by the way—how will I ever live with a partner? Here I am, again, on a thought, and forgetting which pose is next. And why don’t more people know about the boycott against Coca-Cola for killing trade unionists in Colombia? And I really do need to sweep the house before the meeting here tonight.

And then there is the sitting still for a while, with a rakusu, cross-legged. Then I put a few dollars in my pocket and pull on my red suede Medellin boots and walk a block to the 24 Liquor Grocery, which is not actually open twenty-four hours a day, but is open on Monday at seven AM, which it is. On the walk, I am surprised by the pleasure of breathing, of breath entering and leaving, and by the pleasure of walking, of my muscles moving. It is not so cold out, and the birds go on and on and on, like it’s springtime, which maybe it is.

We are not going to fail at our lives, you know.

I will lead a very interesting life. I will be very alive. I will enjoy it very much. I will keep doing my best—but my best to be kind, to all beings, starting with this one right here.

I will remember this; and I will forget it again. And I will remember and forget and remember and forget. Just like we return to our breath in zazen, I will return to this being at home in myself, to being relaxed and joyful, and to curiously relishing the unfolding of this life.

(Sarah Weintraub is the Executive Director of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship.)

Dash in Picture Frame

2010-03-17T19:01:00.001-05:00

Mountains and Waters Introduction: A path to walk (Sarah Webb)

2010-01-04T13:56:00.003-06:00

Time among leaves, rock, and water can give us a way to practice. It’s not that Zen is a religion of nature but that natural settings give us opportunities to pay attention, simplify our lives, and escape the constraints of social reality. We may sense our unity with a hillside or a fish. We may walk, recognizing the sacred everywhere we look.

In Mountains and Waters, our new issue of Just This, students share how the natural world has informed their practice. It may be an experience of water, as it is for Juniper, who finds lake voyaging becomes an inner voyage. David returns repeatedly to a place that speaks to him, the Big Bend, to explore its landscape and encounter its animals. Camping alone, Sarah also prizes encounters that reveal our unity with other beings — wildflowers and pines, snakes, flickers, and her little dog. For Kim and Glenn, a river under blossoms or a garden shaped to express Zen understanding show natural beauty in a city environment. Brandon sees a city river, too, and the lives of those who shelter under its bridges, and he experiences compassion.

It would be possible to practice in nature entirely in stillness and silence, but these practitioners have taken a further step. Part of their practice is response. Photographs, drawings, paintings, and writings are the fruits of their attention. They hope their art can say what came into their hearts.

Completeness (Dogen)

2010-01-04T13:54:00.002-06:00

“Mountains and waters right now are the actualization of the ancient Buddha way. Each, abiding in its phenomenal expression, realizes completeness.” —Dogen, translated by Arnold Kotler and Kazuaki Tanahashi

Tookers Island (Lauren Ross)

2010-01-04T13:52:00.005-06:00

Outdoor exploring gives Juniper (Lauren Ross) a way to practice and create. She says, "Three of the poems were written on Tookers Island at the end of a week of solo kayaking on Lake Superior.

Zen mindfulness is the ground of my solo adventures. Mindfulness and the present moment keep me safe. Much is birthed from there, including poetry."

You were perfect on the day

that I died rather than leave you.

The seas were calm.

The barest ripple

marked hidden rocks.

The sun blazed,

half-hidden by clouds.

The air was still with possibility.

There are stones of gem quality

And views to dazzle post cards.

But nothing of any value

Is carried

Beyond these shores.

I came to know a perfect moment

when it is certain that the day will bring

No more wind

Than I can handle.

I came to remember how and when

knowing arises in the belly

I came to forget a thousand neglected necessities

So as not to be distracted from what

is unimportant

and essential.

I came to watch uncountable stars

fill the night sky;

and to remember why nights without moon

shine.

I came to watch the sunrise and sunsets

of eternity.

It is only now, in leaving,

that I've remembered why I came.

If I should die upon the water;

Set off from shore

and not return,

Do not grieve for me.

I knew a hundred stony beaches

Uncounted wave-washed shores,

And the unfiltered sun on a January afternoon.

3-23-2003

...your mother's face. (Reb Anderson)

2010-01-04T13:50:00.002-06:00

"Walk on the earth as if it is your mother's face." —Reb Anderson

Big Bend Zen (David Warren)

2010-01-04T13:48:00.005-06:00

Extreme rain falling in the Big Bend. The landscape seemed to come straight from a Chinese scroll painting.

Eye of the Rabbit

“Photography is a lie!” declared my college professor. The overall scene is edited down to what the artist selects to be viewed; therefore the whole is not revealed. But places like Big Bend can push us to try to pass those limits. Few people know the ironic experience of a flooding deluge in this desert park. That’s why I took this picture. This desert is unforgiving, hot and deadly. It is not uncommon to learn of the tragic end of a visitor who did not have enough water.

Big Bend National Park is one of the few places on earth one can actually find near absolute silence. Situated in the vast Chihuahuan desert are mountains that hide a conifer/oak forest high above. There is no commercial air traffic overhead, save for an occasional tourist plane. Whether you are up in the mountains or out in the desert, you hear only wind, wildlife, and when those are still, then you can hear the pulse in your own head. There are views of incomprehensible distances into Mexico when there is no air pollution or rain.

Nature does not respect Man’s artificial boundaries or expectations. When in Big Bend, you not only watch the sunset, you become part of the sunset. You are whatever the elements make you. Embrace the dirt. Play in rain. Melt with snow. I forget how many times I have visited Big Bend. I return over and over, yet it is never the same experience. It is and always will be, yet ever changing in its own time and its own way. This is also what Zazen is for me. —David Warren

Maligned animals are of personal interest. Rattlesnakes and vultures are not bad critters, and rabbits can defend themselves. The “eye” painting is an autobiographical piece which attempts to defy dualistic thought about animals.

See more of David's art: davidwarrendesigns.com

Thusness (Gary Snyder)

2010-01-04T13:46:00.002-06:00

"This, thusness, is the nature of the nature of nature. The wild in the wild." —Gary Snyder

Holbrook (Sarah Webb)

2010-01-04T13:44:00.003-06:00

Sarah Webb spent the last three summers on the road (half camping alone). She wanted to see if silent presence with trees and mountains might deepen her practice. This essay is drawn from journal entries at one of her camps.

Poems (Sherry Priest)

2010-01-04T13:42:00.002-06:00

Nature presents itself in small moments for Sherry Priest, in kinhin or sitting or walking out of doors.

Kinhin

I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself. —H.D. Lawrence

Crow cocks one eye
At the kinhin line
And grins

Not until winter
do we see
how many
nests
the trees hold

You have had
some small thing,
a toy,
Or maybe an old shirt,
worn,
held,
loved into an unsustainable fragility,
Until you knew
No longer holding was the only possibility
That is how you must let go.

Opening practice and
Just past the door of our solemn rite
A grackle altercation
Two more birds and it would have been a riot

Betting Against the House

Always
Bargaining with God
Leveraging karma
To bank against loss
Betting against the house

Zen Poem # 2

Sitting thru zazen
cricket crawls in hakama
fucking hilarious

Notes on #2: When I first started practicing zazen with a group I found the lack of external stimulation nerve-wracking, leading to an impulse to jump up screaming and run from the room. I dealt with it in a number of very un-zen-like ways, including playing the alphabet game with myself and writing poetry in my head. This was in fact what jump-started this phase of my writing career, if you can call it that.

Our group, which practices in the Rinzai style in which people sit in lines facing each other, meets right after Wednesday night aikido class, which most of us also participate in. For that reason, many times we would still be dressed in gi and hakama. Gi are the white pants and top that one associates with martial arts. A hakama is a kind of full, pleated pants, usually black or navy, that ties on and is worn over the gi.

In late summer in central Texas there are often swarms of crickets. One evening a cricket crawled onto the mats and began steadily making its way to our lines. I became fascinated with its movements and obsessed with what I would do if it crawled up the leg of my hakama. In Rinzai one is strongly discouraged from moving even a little for anything short of sudden illness. At the last minute, the cricket veered across the mat and appeared to climb on a friend sitting across from me, who, in at least the outward appearance of perfect Zen mind, never moved. Given the way zazen messes with your brain, the whole event was one of the most entertaining things I have ever seen.

Zen Poem #3

Which is worse
zazen with caffeine
or without

Notes on #3: The first one of my flashes of insight happened while I was waiting for the coffee bartender to make me a cappuccino. I was standing in the lobby of the building where I have worked for over a decade and suddenly it looked both completely new to me and completely familiar. And I felt, not knew in my head but really felt, a sense of being a traveler in my own life. I’ve had other, similar experiences, one at the grocery store, which I lost by the time I made it through check-out. Another occurred driving on a downtown street when everything, the buildings, the road itself, the other cars, all of a sudden genuinely looked fluid, like the water in a river. Either that or it was the heat.

This poem isn’t really about that, though. It’s about whether it’s harder to deal with the dull pain of struggling to stay awake while remaining motionless in a dark room late at night or to remain at least outwardly calm while double shots of espresso course through your pounding veins.

Zen Poem #4

Dark lake
Cold rain
White swans

Zen Poem #6

How is pain not suffering?
Primroses, horsemint
Wild grass.

First There is a Mountain (Kim Mosley, Donovan)

2010-01-04T13:40:00.003-06:00

First there is a mountain.
(Painting—Kim Mosley)

—Donovan

There is no mountain.
(Painting—Kim Mosley)

...dusty world of human affairs. (Gary Snyder)

2010-01-04T13:36:00.002-06:00

“Mountains and waters’ is a way to refer to the totality of the process of nature. . . . The whole, with its rivers and valleys, obviously includes farms, fields, villages, cities and the (once comparatively small) dusty world of human affairs." —Gary Snyder

Asian Gardens (Kim and Linda Mosley)

2010-01-04T13:34:00.006-06:00

Suiho-en, the Japanese Garden
at the Donald C. Tillman Water Reclamation Plant,
Van Nuys, California USA

Figures at Pond, St. Louis, MO
(Ceramics and garden—Linda Mosley)

Japanese rock garden, Portland, OR
(枯山水, karesansui) or "dry landscape" garden

Chinese Garden, from Street, Portland, OR

Confucius says...

Photos: Kim and Linda Mosley

As the World Surrenders (Kim Mosley)

2010-01-04T13:32:00.004-06:00

"As the river surrenders itself to the ocean,

what is inside me moves inside you." —Kabir
(Painting—Kim Mosley)