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#1440 - Sunday, May 25, 2003 - Editor: Gloria
Listen,
all creeping things -
the bell of transience.~Issa
In an afternoon of locust sound
a red-tailed hawk alights upon
the gray and greening walnut tree
out in a meadow golden slowly
turning in a blueness swirling
tree and hunter equally into the
vast approaching night, the
moon-lace light, the star-spun
night of some delight beyond
the ken of color, keener
than an insects' teeth
upon a walnut's leaves,
green things winding
mindlessly around themselves
for comfort, extending life
for sake of life, unconcerned
their flowers at the dawn of day
may blossom into meals for preying
Yamas sitting fat upon the branches
of a tree with roots in that same soil
that anchors it beneath a sky that knows
no light no dark no life no death no other wonder.
~Mazie & b
Joseph Riley Panhala
I Think Continually of Those
I think continually of those who were truly great.
Who, from the womb, remembered the soul's history
Through corridors of light where the hours are suns,
Endless and singing. Whose lovely ambition
Was that their lips, still touched with fire,
Should tell of the spirit clothed from head to foot in song.
And who hoarded from the spring branches
The desires falling across their bodies like blossoms. What is precious is never to forget
The delight of the blood drawn from ancient springs
Breaking through rocks in worlds before our earth;
Never to deny its pleasure in the simple morning light,
Nor its grave evening demand for love;
Never to allow gradually the traffic to smother
With noise and fog the flowering of the spirit. Near the snow, near the sun, in the highest fields
See how these names are fêted by the waving grass,
And by the streamers of white cloud,
And whispers of wind in the listening sky;
The names of those who in their lives fought for life,
Who wore at their hearts the fire's center.
Born of the sun, they traveled a short while towards the sun,
And left the vivid air signed with their honor.
~ Stephen Spender ~
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Mazie Lane BeingOne
Wind and Water and Stone
The water hollowed the stone,
the wind dispersed the water,
the stone stopped the wind.
Water and wind and stone.
The wind sculpted the stone,
the stone is a cup of water,
The water runs off and is wind.
Stone and wind and water.
The wind sings in its turnings,
the water murmurs as it goes,
the motionless stone is quiet.
Wind and water and stone.
One is the other and is neither:
among their empty names
they pass and disappear,
water and stone and wind.
"Wind and Water and Stone" by Octavio Paz, translated by Mark
Strand, from "The Collected Poems of Octavio Paz, 1957-1987."
Copyright 1979 by The New Yorker Magazine.
Joyce (know_mystery) Spiritual Friends
Spring-Watching Pavilion
"A gentle spring evening arrives
airily, unclouded by worldly dust.
Three times the bell tolls echoes like a wave.
We see heaven upside-down in sad puddles.
Love's vast sea cannot be emptied.
And springs of grace flow easily everywhere.
Where is nirvana?
Nirvana is here, nine times out of ten."
~ Ho Xuan Huong ~
18th Century Vietnamese Poet
From "Spring Essence: The Poetry of Ho Xuan Huong" ; Translated by John Balaban; Copper Canyon Press, 2000
Mazie & b from ShivAllahSita sutra 99
Earth knows no desolation. She smells regeneration
in the moist breath of decay.~George Meredith
Come my spade. There is no ancient gentlemen but gardeners, ditchers,
and grave-makers; they hold up Adam's profession.~Shakespeare, Hamlet V,I
You find a flower half-buried in leaves,
And in your eye its very fate resides.
Loving beauty, you caress the bloom;
Soon enough, you'll sweep petals from the floor.Terrible to love the lovely so,
To count your own years, to say "I'm old,"
To see a flower half-buried in leaves
And come face to face with what you are.~Han Shan, circa 630 CE
Translated by Peter Stambler
Cold Mountain Buddhas
When we are softened and opened enough to
accept things as they actually are, to
accept that we are, yet
can never know
what that is,
the old conflict knotting
the heart, the wanting of something
to be other than
what it is,
subsides.
There is great mercy here.
We can allow the anxious animals to
move closer and huddle next to us --
all searching creatures of the daylight,
yearning for the welcoming embrace of
a tenderly falling night.
Vastness pumps itself luxuriously
through every bloodstream,
circling an oasis named
the heart.
The heart is the abode;
it has no boundary of flesh,
thought, feeling.
This bloodstream originates
in the same source as
anxious animals,
lovers, sense of
self.
The energy required to resist
and oppose is the same that
powers the contraption of clinging.
I left that rusting machine at the base of
Cold Mountain, near the riverbank with
my uniform of reason, and now I float,
naked on the currents, dazzled by
the glinting streambed stones
passing swiftly beneath me.~Mazie & b
Let children walk with Nature, let them see the beautiful
blendings and communions of death and life, their joyous
inseparable unity, as taught in woods and meadows,
plains and mountains and streams of our blessed star,
and they will learn that death is stingless indeed,
and as beautiful as life.~John Muir
We must endure our thoughts all night, until
The bright obvious stands motionless in the cold.~Wallace Stevens
Terry Murphy SufiMystic
*The Tower of the Spirit*
The spirit has an impregnable tower
Which no danger can disturb
As long as the tower is guarded
By the invisible Protector
Who acts unconsciously, and whose
actions
Go astray when they become deliberate,
Reflexive, and intentional.
The unconsciousness
And entire sincerity of Tao
Are disturbed by any effort
At self-conscious demonstration.
All such demonstrations
Are lies.
When one displays himself
The world outside storms in
And imprisons him.
He is no longer protected
By the sincerity of Tao.
Each new act
Is a new failure.
If his acts are done in public,
In broad daylight,
He will be punished by men.
lf they are done in private
And in secret,
They will be punished
By spirits.
Let each one understand
The meaning of sincerity
And guard against display!
He will be at peace
With men and spirits
And will act rightly, unseen,
In his own solitude,
In the tower of his spirit.
from "The Way of Chuang Tzu" trans Merton
Gill Eardley Rumi-Hafiz
Recommendation
by Thich Nhat Hanh
Promise me,
promise me this day,
promise me now,
while the sun is overhead
exactly at the zenith,
promise me:
Even as they strike you down
with a mountain of hatred and violence;
even as they step on you and crush you like a worm,
even as they dismember and disembowel you,
remember, brother,
remember:
man is not your enemy.
The only thing worthy of you is compassion --
invincible, limitless, unconditional.
Hatred will never let you face the beast in man.
One day, when you face this beast alone,
with your courage intact, your eyes kind, untroubled
(even as no one sees them),
out of your smile will bloom a flower.
And those who love you
will behold you
across ten thousands worlds of birth and dying.
Alone again,
I will go on with bent head,
knowing that love has become eternal.
On the long, rough road,
the sun and the moon
will continue to shine.
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