The practice of Zen

The practice of Zen
Has no secret,
Except standing on the
Verge of life and death.

- Takeda Shingen (1521-1573)

I can't tell you what art does

I can't tell you what art does and how it does it, but I know that often art has judged the judges, pleaded revenge to the innocent and shown to the future what the past suffered, so that it has never been forgotten. Art, when it functions like this, becomes a meeting-place of the invisible, the irreducible, the enduring, guts, and honor.

Berger, John

The empty sky listened with a cold heart

In my pot nothing but the wind’s deep moan,
For company only a staff of wisteria vine;
Last night we chatted and laughed till all hours
The empty sky listened with a cold heart.

- Muso Soseki (1275–1351)

Going home

Does one really have to fret
About enlightenment?
No matter what road I travel,
I’m going home.

- Shinsho

Like strangers on the road

For twenty seven years
I’ve always sought the Way.
Well, this morning we passed
Like strangers on the road.

- Kokuin (10th century)

Behind a blood-stained curtain

Behind a blood-stained curtain, love has spread its gardens.
Lovers are busy with the beauty of the love that is beyond explanation.
Intellect says: 'The six directions are the limit, there is nothing beyond them.'
Love says:'There is a road, and I have journeyed on it many times.'
Love detected markets beyond that market.
Intellect says:'Do not set foot on the land of annihilation;
There is nothing there but thorns.'
Love says;'Those thorns you feel are only inside you!
Be silent! remove the thorn of existence from the foot of the heart;
So that you may see the gardens within.'
O Shams of Tabriz! you are the Sun cloaked by the cloud of speech;
When your Sun rose, all the words melted!

(Divan 132:1-3, 6-8)

What exactly is it that you want?

What exactly is it that you want?

Independence of mind and will. Ability to make one's own decisions, without having to kowtow to anyone else, without having to make unwilling compromises because someone else has to be considered and accommodated.

To have just the one person, that is yours forever, that loves you and you alone, that is faithful in word, thought and deed, that considers you and your needs above all else.

To achieve in your career, to be recognized for the person that you are, for your skills and accomplishments, not for who you are with or accompany.

To have children, that you love and who love you in return. Who you help grow and mature and become wonderful human beings in their own right. Who bring you joy and comfort as you grow older.

To do your own thing, when you want to do it for the reasons that you want or please you. At your own pace, with no demands from others except for the demands that you consciously agree to.

To be with someone, to feel human warmth and contact, to grow more intimate in a most meaningful manner over the years, to have companionship into your old age, that is just there and demands nothing more than it is there.

To choose who you want to be with, when you want to be with them. To choose to be with a different person or persons whenever it suits. To define the parameters of your relationships according to what you think or want, however that may change over time.

To be transported to the ends of pleasure by the person that you love, and who loves you in return. By your true love, for it is true love that defines the ends of pleasure, that maps the extent of bounding one's world, of transforming profane to sublime.

To love and be loved, utterly and absolutely, forever and forever.

Look - conditions

Look. There was one who was enlightened with the sound of a bamboo being struck and another who clarified his mind upon seeing peach blossoms. Is the bamboo bright or dull, deluded or enlightened? Are peach blossoms shallow or deep, wise or foolish? Although flowers blossom year after year, not everyone who sees them is enlightened. When a bamboo cracks, not everyone who hears it realizes the way.

Enlightenment and clarity of the mind occur only in response to the sustained effort of study and practice. Endeavoring in the way ripens the conditions of your practice. It is not that the sound of the bamboo is sharp or the color of the blossoms is vivid. Although the sound of the bamboo is wondrous, it is heard at the moment when it’s hit by a pebble. Although the color of the blossoms is beautiful, they do not open by themselves but unfold in the light of springtime. Studying the way is like this. You attain the way when conditions come together. Although you have your own capacity, you practice the way with the combined strength of the community. So you should practice and search with one mind with others.

- Dogen (1200-1253)

Whom have I encountered in my dream last night?

You are happy, happy, but I am a thousand times happier!
Whom have I encountered in my dream last night? I know not.
I am so happy, I cannot be contained in the world;
But like a spirit, I am hidden from the eyes of the world.
If the foot of the trees were not tied to earth, they would be pursuing me;
For I have blossomed so much, I am the envy of the gardens.

(Divan 1740:1-3)

A little "Over The Top" methinks

What we know as 'life' is the analytical realization in the seriality of time of our eternal reality. - Why Lazurus Laughed by Wei Wu Wei

Oneness

This shape I have, O master, who do I look like?
One moment I am a fairy, the next and enchanter of one.
Burning with enthusiasms, I am both the candle and the crowd gathered around it;
I am the smoke and the light, together and scattered at once.

(Divan 1465:1-2)

My perplexity is more perplexing

There is no edge to my vast desert;
There is no peace for my heart and my soul.
The world is taken, from end to end, by image and form;
Which of these images is mine?
If you see a severed head on the way
Rolling in the direction of the battlefied;
Ask him, ask him concerning my secrets
For, from him you hear my hidden mysteries.
What if one ear could be found;
Suited to understand the speech of my birds.
What if one bird could fly,
Who wore my ring of Solomon's secrets [around her neck].
What am I saying? when I know telling this tale
Is beyond my limits and my ability is.
How can I utter one word when each moment
My perplexity is more perplexing.

(Divan 239:1-8)

Thoughts and Dreams were reality. Long long future way - full of hope and concern.

Thoughts and Dreams were reality. Long long future way - full of hope and concern.

Quiescence

Devote yourself to the Absolute Emptiness;
Contemplate earnestly in Quiescence.
All things are together in Action,
But I look into their Non-action,
For things are continuously moving, restless,
Yet each is proceeding back to its origin.
Proceeding back to the origin means Quiescence.
To be in Quiescence is to see “Being-for-itself.”

- Lao tzu

Perspective

However deep your knowledge of the scriptures,
It is no more than a strand of hair
In the vastness of space;
However important seeming your worldly experience,
It is but a drop of water in a deep ravine.

- Tokusan

Behold the blasphemy that is faith!

I have come without a heart, without a soul;
Look at my color, read the lines on my face, O my boy!
No, I am wrong, I have not come at all, you came to me;
You came with me, hidden in my existence, O my boy!
Simile in the face of fire like a piece of gold;
And good fortune will smile at you. O my boy!

In the tavern of my heart there are thoughts
Fighting each other like drunks, O my boy!
Bear [with me] and listen to the clamor of the intoxicated;
Ah, the door broke! the doorman run away! O my boy!
I have come, and I have brought you a mirror;
Look at yourself, do not turn your face, O my boy!
My blasphemy is a mirror for your faith;
Behold the blasphemy that is faith! O my boy!
I cry out in silence;
I have come to be a silent speaker, O my boy!

(Divan 1098:1-8)
Rumi

The future but a way to death

"It is a time when one's spirit is subdued and sad, one knows not why; when the past seems a storm-swept desolation, life a vanity and a burden, and the future but a way to death."

- Mark Twain

The world of our sad humanity

"There are moments when, even to the sober eye of Reason, the world of our sad humanity must assume the aspect of Hell"

- Edgar Allan Poe

Sadness flies away on the wings of time

"Sadness flies away on the wings of time."

- Jean de La Fontaine

Tears, idle tears

Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean.
Tears from the depth of some divine despair
Rise in the heart and gather to the eyes,
In looking on the happy autumn-fields,
And thinking of the days that are no more.

- Alfred Lord Tennyson