i am
not ashamed
to say i am
a lover of god
the fire
of my soul
my friend
my beloved
my heart
my ocean
where i am
the fish
my sky
where i am
the bird
flying home
Tag: being
leave no trace
walk upon the earth
like a cloud
leave everything
as you found it
watch the sunrise
and sleep after sunset
be forgotten
then forget yourself
Temple
I walked into the deep darkness of being
Suddenly there was light all around
Where I thought only darkness abounds
I found my heart is my temple
There I shall spend the rest of my days
”Ars Poetica” by Archibald MacLeish
A poem should be palpable and mute
As a globed fruit,
Dumb
As old medallions to the thumb,
Silent as the sleeve-worn stone
Of casement ledges where the moss has grown—
A poem should be wordless
As the flight of birds.
*
A poem should be motionless in time
As the moon climbs,
Leaving, as the moon releases
Twig by twig the night-entangled trees,
Leaving, as the moon behind the winter leaves,
Memory by memory the mind—
A poem should be motionless in time
As the moon climbs.
*
A poem should be equal to:
Not true.
For all the history of grief
An empty doorway and a maple leaf.
For love
The leaning grasses and two lights above the sea—
A poem should not mean
But be.
Silly Musings on Keeping Your Hands Off
“The arising and the elimination of illusion are both illusory. Illusion is not something rooted in Reality; it exists because of your dualistic thinking.
If you will only cease to indulge in opposed concepts such as ‘ordinary’ and ‘Enlightened’, illusion will cease of itself. And then if you still want to destroy it wherever it may be, you will find that there is not a hairsbreadth left of anything on which to lay hold.
This is the meaning of: ‘I will let go with both hands, for then I shall certainly discover the Buddha in my mind’.”
‘The nature of the Mind when understood, No human speech can compass or disclose. Enlightenment is naught to be attained, And he that gains it does not say he knows.’
-Bodhidharma
—from The Zen Teaching of Huang Po
I’ve been studying the early sources of zen, which is the Japanese name and Buddhist/Indian sources. I use the lower case there because what is written is not Zen. You can’t really study Zen on anonymous social media sites. But the discussions can be interesting and revealing of our dualitic thinking.
Anyone claiming truth is making a power play.
No word can reveal this, silence enshrines it.
Piercing sensory perception and conceptual thought brings an immediate end to illusion. This is directly seeing and perceiving with the mysterious intuition. This awareness is not exclusive to Zen. Plotinus and Eckart seemed to have come to the same place as the sages.
Hands off, yes, indeed.
—-
I think this is where the best art comes from.
Feeling this fire is one aspect, but walking into it is a whole other experience.
Walking into the fire is an act of self immolation, sacrifice and an overcoming of fear and is maybe the only courageous thing we can do.
No longer bound by talent or skill or lack thereof, but truly transcending these.
I would say walking into the fire is an act of faith as well and opens a portal to nowhere and everywhere.
The raw expression of Jack Kerouac from ‘On the Road’ or the writing of his insane mad friend, Neal Cassady, being western examples.
An enlightened, if sad teacher, Harold Bloom, explored the American Sublime deeply through our literature. I like his thinking on these subjects. He’s a bit too brilliant for me though 😉
Reading Jack Kerouac again and Neal recently and Bloom’s Opus, The Daemon Knows as well as the old zen texts.
Jack and his band of merry fools were maybe Holy Barbarians.
Something in their Barbarian ways speaks deeply to me.
I spent my own wild crazy days on the road.
Now I just enjoy sitting in the garden.
But that fire lifts you up at key times and can consume you.
It is too intense to live in.
The Open Road somehow feels like a quick path to death.
How many artists have been destructively consumed by the fire of their passions?
But our deeper passions can save us.
Compare these artistic shooting stars to the sages who lived to 120.
I can’t say one way is better than the other.
But I’m in no hurry to shuffle off this mortal coil.
Blow your horn!
Rage rage rage against the dying of the light.
To Thine Own Self Be True
I have seen the fields of light
I have run with all my might
I have been touched by golden light
I have now taken flight
When they punch my ticket
I’ll go gently into the night
But until then
I shall enjoy my flight
—smelly da 🐐
subjectless
clear your mind
heal your heart
meet silence
abandon yourself
face your shit
stick around
write some poetry
feel the flow
enjoy the glow
Dying My Last Breath
Oh the echoes in my mind
From ancient times to midnight row
What a distance the golden bird has flown
I’m running with the wolves tonight
I dream of being alive
Will we ever speak again
Can I have back what I broke
I have born the scorn of the forlorn
I sit here on a sunken boat
23
The everyday mind: that is the way.
Buried in vines and rock-bound caves,
Here it’s wild, here I am free,
Idling with the white clouds, my friends.
Tracks here never reach the world;
No-mind, so what can shift my thought?
I sit the night through on a bed of stone,
While the moon climbs Cold Mountain.
—Hanshan
96
Have I a body or have I none?
Am I who I am or am I not?
Pondering these questions,
I sit leaning against the cliff while the
years go by,
Till the green grass grows between my feet
And the red dust settles on my head,
And the men of the world, thinking me dead,
Come with offerings of wine and fruit
to lay by my corpse.
—Cold Mountain
Quantum Heart 