Meetings with teachers

Meeting with my teacher

looks like this:

like morning fog

brushing canyon tops

releases streams

that lead the way back.

**

The old masters wrote

of winter’s long nights,

of emptied trees, of snow’s weight

sighed away in spring streams,

rivered trickles of dew drops

carrying oceans carrying

sun-lit moon light.

Of these things, I would write.

**

Can’t say, even at this age, I know who I am.

Keep writing, walking, and the rest follows, mostly

work of love. Incense at day’s end, a song,

moments of quiet, together—as all comes to rest,

the wish for justice in a troubled world.

**

For Juan Carter

--Spring Equinox

Half way through my walk,

half way, crossing the black top,

a banana slug….

**

Fluid and porous:

the distinctions we think

hold and frame our lives.

**

Curious, that those

with heart beats, resist both change

and its presumed end.

**

After meeting with the teacher,

relief—he doesn’t know, either.

**

I write and people read. Amazing

and no small thing—liberated horizons

mean everything.

**

Tending as we do,

as a matter of habit, toward loneliness,

we are in fact never alone.

**

Looking closely, I see my living

largely haphazard, unfulfilled intentions

and broken promises…

Namuamidabutsu

**

Any place will do

Truth-seeking poets seek nowhere to stand,

pass away their time watching

for flashes and flickers in the flow,

following what catches attention

for the moment—leave it all at that.

Just a life.

**

Night rains slow and cease,

darkness holds still,

and doves wait their signal.

**

The pause…

It’s often the first words, fresh

off the tongue that are most telling,

even while we’re not so sure

what was meant to be said.

Is it possible to rest there

in the question, savor the uncertainty,

before circling, tightening?

**

**

Cool morning. The pine

lets its scent fall

to the street.

**

Why poetry?

Fundamental to human spirit is unity,

thoroughgoing correspondence within

the entirety of energies of the universe

—which is why we can’t catch it.

And neither can they.

Thoughts on vocation…

March 2012

It’s not about poetics, nor practice,

but about exploration of the organic power

of language, the whole within which we participate

as matter of human fact, without which

we are not fully human.

Do we compose, or are we composed—

the rising response within the currents

of continuing contexts of human experience in its fullness

is Buddha’s teaching of nembutsu, remembrance

of original source, through the repeated resonances

of words, uncontrived, complete as conceived, the true

and real spontaneous creativity of unbounded breath

sounded in place and time,

the call-response of moment to moment listening.

Namuamidabutsu

**

Tree limbs akimbo,

splash and ride the waves and winds

of oceans of rain.

**

Ninety percent of

salmon in our streams are hatched

in farms. They’re leaving.

**

Married life made everything real for me,

as had nothing else, and the children, and continues

to hold true as age shapes the lift of horizons

no longer so distant.

Yet, and nonetheless, it’s been

Buddha’s teaching and the scratch of the pen

that have traced the silent forms of sustenance

of this most commonplace dance.

**

The young almond tree

that stands behind the Buddha

bursts with blossoms so suddenly

we cannot contain our laughter—trails

of not so quiet prayers—this year’s first fruit.

**

Men’s Work

The grandson and I work, an easy pace.

We lift and carry, and measure and cut,

tools banging and screeching.

We sweep and clean, admire and excuse,

reason and plan. You know, men doing men’s work

together. You know the kind—it sings

while they hum along.

**

Who our contemporaries are

is a matter of who

we’re exchanging words with.

**

Only the hummingbird can reach

the deep-throated bottom of the brilliant blossom

of its namesake sage.

**

Leap Year?

Is there a difference here, so near

the outer edge of breath’s urge, and at

earth’s center, and its work?

**

All morning, thinking

of doing

haiku

And what that might mean

in real time,

today

And thinking it not

different

from then—

Immediacy

unfolding

simply

Of itself, and we

as a part of it—

being

And all that comes with

that simple extended breath

**

Of old friends

and all that’s already said—

a voice on the phone.

**

It’s called an “in-law” unit,

but he’s not—intimacy

in the sound of a sum pump.

**

I find vanity

more resilient than body.

Wonder which will go first?

**

Thinking of Ryokan,

that river at the base of his mountain.

There were no buses then.

**

It’s not so much planned,

that my mornings are spent like this,

a bit longer each time, in the chair,

with pen to the page;

but it is the first urge.

**

At age 67

Many of the disciplines

I’d thought indispensable

have fallen into disuse.

**

The daughter’s friend

Her earliest recollection,

some thirty-five years now,

is of my anger—exposed.

**

Dimmed by the waxing moon,

Orion barely holds

to the night sky.

**

I demurred, again demurred.

And then, it went

to someone else.

**

After last night,

only puddles remain.

And the wind.

**

As always, he was well-meaning,

but those he spoke of as no longer present

in current consciousness, were my teachers.

Still very much here.

**

Sometimes morning light

so slowly bares the steadiness

of earth-held things

that even the tongue knows

to be still—then, a breeze,

rippled leaves, speaks enough

for everything.

**

Stay close children

The earth’s message is always the same,

it’s voice the quiet model

too often muffled by too careless footsteps.

**

On the carpet, among broken

colors of stained glass,

fallen thoughts.

**

A flash at my feet,

to the top of the fence,

and into the crook of the almond tree.

Safe, behind intervening blossoms,

we calm, and look at each other.

**

From behind the bamboo curtain,

moon’s light flickers

through passing clouds—silent entreaty

of an old friend. I signal back

with the pen.

Notes

Notes to myself #3

February 7, 2012

“Praxis” does not simply mean practice. It means activities, actions undertaken that are fulfilled in and of themselves—whole, organic, self-fulfilling—as opposed to actions undertaken in order to accomplish a goal that lies beyond the action itself.

Shinran calls nembutsu “Great Practice,” precisely because it is fulfilled in its very utterance--praxis. Suzuki translates Shinran’s “practice” as “living.”

Poems share this quality, and I believe I’ve come closer to understanding my life in nembutsu through a greater intimacy with poets and poems.

**

Read “poem,” think “nembutsu”:

The point of the poem is the poem itself, catching our attention in that way that turns our head, holds us, disarms, even for a moment, all other concerns. Our being arrested in the mystery of hearing more than the words spoken.

Language as tool eclipsed by words as experienced event. An opened opportunity for learning something new.

Poems can be found in the most ordinary exchanges between us, if we’re listening.

It’s not about another “use” of our words, but a different awareness of our natural engagement with words, a different awareness of our living as humans that opens opportunities for sustenance and growth.

Nembutsu and the poem are lived events, experiences that are true, real and whole in and

of themselves, not transactions for some other purpose.

Moments of awareness that evoke not anticipation for what is to come, but appreciation and gratitude for what is happening, what has occurred. A gifted taste that most often moves us to want to share.

**

And in this, I pause, as did the poet Kenneth Rexroth, “in my sixth decade,” and wonder at who I am and what I’ve learned, or not, who I’ve become in this tangled, unruly insistence toward nembutsu and poems, practitioners and poets—in the truth of their lives as heard in their words, through their dedication to this, I find my own. Home then, “sangha,” community. Intimate fellows of no little significance. Namuamidabutsu

Meditations

New threads…

First time, morning with

the new daughter and grandson,

rising together.

The lunch box is blue,

a sturdy cloth bag, hand grip

hung from thin fingers.

Rains blew cold throughout

the night. Muffins, juice and tea.

The furnace kicks in.

Like heart beats, these two.

When you’re close enough to hear,

you can feel the heat.

**

All this time…

The beard is white, the hair thin

and wisdom as untouchable as wind

dances where it will.

And amidst the swirl, words

arise to fall to the page, names to utter

in darkness.

Nonsense sounds of sutras, and of things,

meet in the slippery moment, settled

heart and mind,

centered,

the coalescing world

as it is.

The poem is not in

the book, Sam Hamill writes,

the poem is “in the self,”

is of the self become realized,

of the world

aware.

Not an object to be held, except

as on the breath,

the poem is a lived truth.

**

Remembering Bali

The old woman sits beside the passing traffic

selling cigarettes through windows

opened at the stop light.

She counts a wad of bills, weighs change

with knowing fingers,

in the iron heat of afternoon.

Each window gets a squinted glance,

every return

receives its due.

**

The trickle

doesn’t make itself,

it’s the push

of depths at the source

and the pull

of unknown destinations

unfolding,

the flow rejoined…

**

Not one thing the world presents is unworthy

of our attention, nor separate from

our awakening.

Basho suggests one last thing left to learn,

simply, “accept the kindnesses

of strangers.”

**

The poem is in the self.

Sam Hamill

The words just run at times,

slip to the page, looking

a lot like poems might.

But to come to hear Hamill,

recalls for me Ryokan,

who wrote, not “poems,” but

his mind, his heart-mind, his self

as it danced and ran with the world,

as does the poem.

**

Closing pages

The sun drops below the horizon here

well before five, shadows quit, light shifts

to grey cool, a quiet pause,

then headlong rush to winter’s long nights

that leave me numbed, wounded

for lack of light.

“Seasonal depression,” the doctors call it,

the body-mind complex struggles

with too little light—unacceptable,

it responds with lingering sluggishness,

calling over and again for more rest, until

I remember, and speak its name.

Like this evening, the barest show of pink

above the darkening ridge.

Street lights sparkle to life in the hills,

dark’s resting place before rising

to the waiting sky, stars

marking the slow drift of the heavens.

The human mind reaches for the unseeable

by way of words, imagination

moving into waiting meaning—articulation

revealing what cannot be known,

lips saying,

in order to learn what one wants

to say.

The new year--moving in

Poem*

That glimmer of sunlight

in the distant window

to the west signaling

the coming of the sun

into the first-sent light

clearing shadows under

already clear blue skies.

Words occurring in relation,

things voiced and sounded and

joined therein—event—thoughtfeelings

revealing unfolding particularity celebrated,

proliferated…

Love—the urge to share

the heart-mind’s peace—poem.

*gleaned from the work of poet Cid Corman

**

We sit together in late December, watching light

slowly cover the hills to the west, awakened

in the time of giving

to the gift not recognized

till turmoil settles like the dew-like light

of this morning’s wintered sun.

Burdenless, the sustenance of this life’s blood

makes the world larger in its presence,

glimmer with irreversible trends

turned to vows that live in the very flow

we carry that liberates

endless streams of beings,

comforts passions,

teaches all that need be learned

to quiet the excited heart

to gladness.

**

And in the evening, the staccato return

of studied practice and focused effort gives way

to ease the full-throated song.

The self, a story of itself, need not be tamed

but the plot let to broaden beyond its borders—let the self be

to spin its tale

and let the real play begin.

**

As if the mind’s breath swoons

in the swiftness of unlimited possibility

to forget itself long enough to see

it survives without holding on.

**

We give ourselves into Buddha’s teaching

through those who have gone before,

returning that way

to the bedrock of all existences.

**

I’ve not been able to figure if fog has pushed out the night

or the morning in. But here we are.

The same might be said for religious practices

or for the words we live in, if indeed there’s a difference.

Whomever presumes too much specificity here,

loses credibility in these eyes, though trends might be revealed.

Such as effort. Not some hard goal, simply

honest engagement, really doing it.

“Real work,” we might say, movement meaningful

in the doing--meaning doing us.

Rumi’s teacher asked for a poem every day, which they

then studied—his words-life-understanding.

Each day “marked and made conscious.”

Attentions given, explored as is.

Have you ever noticed the silence that follows heartfelt chanting,

any undertaking done fully through,

body and mind unfolded of itself into rest?

**

From behind the stained glass, night sky

pushes colors forward, lamp light reflected,

at times careened in unseen angles

or sometimes held flat, lit as if found out

as opaque, yet refusing to speak of it—like rock

often does, taking all the sun has to offer,

hour after hour, without flinching,

without asking either less or more,

neither comfort nor praise.

Words begin to lose their grip here,

are best abandoned to open-handed intention,

to bared attention—everything before having led here,

nothing lost, all possibilities remain.

**

Certain inclinations, patterns over time,

define unique fluctuations

in the consciousness of our world.

The yellow rose from winter’s garden,

when leaves are to have fallen

to mark the time to prune.

A pink blossom too, on the altar,

a communal sensibility speaking soundlessly

below the scrolled calligraphy

—the trusting heart.

**

The way friends along the way

help you through the rough spots

so that you return whole.

Meditations

All endings speak forward.

**

The Mound in Buckeye Canyon

The coffee is cold, but the thermos’ place in the pack, warm—just my intent

for this wintered mound, as the company is quite good.

Some 5,000 years deep in ancestry. Conversation is easy, but neither distracted

nor light. Better begun with prayer, song perhaps,

and that unstudied pause and collection that allows words to rise from the body

at rest with place and with time,

with all presences thus given their due.

From deep listening, such as this, right future can unfold

and be affirmed, right here.

**

A Gatha

Each morning I step

from the pole’s top to

a foot’s touch and think

I am not falling.

Foolishness like this

abounds where I live,

a most excellent place

to meet the Buddha.

My practice, sloppy,

sporadic, aimless,

I try to follow

only what’s given.

Resorting to trust

where I’ve really none,

I seek guidance that’s

not ever followed,

take refuge with those

who think like me, walk

an endless night, marked

with dim, distant lights.

Receiving unearned

favors and comforts,

offered to someone

not me, I take them.

There is no justice

in this, only gift—

humility too,

gratitude and joy.

Unexplainable.

So what’s left to do

but what needs doing,

as best I can, for

all who may need it.

Namuamidabutsu

**

Too short, a night run through with too long a stream of thoughts,

though certain epiphanies nonetheless, though none of which seeming

to carry much weight with the pen, nor influence

with the blank face of the page.

Disconnect is not real, but the sense and the feel, even so slight,

is not to be denied, however so slight the blinded flight,

the empty bottomed flush of fear, of isolation,

of meaning forgotten.

Yet, and again, doing’s being and meaning somehow carries

in this—the push of the pen to scratching, marks the dust of separation

with remembrance of the fullness of silence,

where dissolution of disconnection illumines

the immeasurable and the unmistakable.

**

There is the grey morning’s cold to contend with,

the constant start and thrum of the furnace and the sun’s long refusal

to touch distant windows to begin the day,

even as I wait without spoken complaint.

In the greater stillness winter brings, patience is its own test.

Butterflies in the making, just below the stiffened grass,

deep-seated roots at work in their own service, and the earth

preparing its surface for the rains to run first,

before the deeper work to come--reminded

in the quieted draw and release of breath, my body settles.

Still is not dormant.

**

Many things come to us in the night to affirm,

to allow doubt’s release ease to untroubled rest,

like rain, with its softest steps, that we hear first

as if we do not, then do, knowing it’s rain

only when we know our hearing,

as if rain comes a lightest possible presence

to wake us to our own, to that most safe harbor,

that surest awakening self as other.

**

A story

Stars are there to assure us night is good.

Moon too. They hold light till morning so that we might rest.

The night, the stars and the moon,

all for us, for all creatures

needing sleep.

**

Two small terracotta birds perch on the railing on the deck outside the window

directly opposite of where I sit,

shift their wings and lift their feet, and do so again and then again,

and each time I start and pause, then see the cup

lifted to the lips, each time a signal, a sign passed through glass invisible

but for this mirrored intersection of recognition

that brings into question lingering presumptions of difference.

**

Felt tipped pens glide like silk without the whisper,

but leave blemishes backside the page, excesses of ease

scattered here and there—for me, this does not do.

Ballpoint, a pencil, better for the effort.

Even the slightest pull speaks to work heard, words working

tangles of confusion toward the light.

Living leaving tracks,

signs, crevices signaling where its been,

where it’s thinking of going.

Uncovered interludes

I’m told I use quiet words

but wonder, really, which those are

the world itself presents itself

as such so often, how else can one respond

the wave’s reach that seeps the sands,

the spray that’s given to air…

of these, as among the many blessings,

not one is loud.

**

That which turns me toward peace,

is my own rage

and the threat that speaks to.

**

Winter’s come, leaves turned and now

fall through mornings clean with the constant chill

of shortened days, the quickened pulse,

the reach for fullness enough to live,

just to live, just enough.

**

Buddha…

the name

held close in the heart

whose public face

is kindness.

**

The angle just so

catches the light underside

burn—a Robin’s breast.

Glimmering there

beneath nonviolence—

no harm.

**

How we hear

Just above the horizon,

under hovering clouds, a thin break

of clarity

the push of light pours

salmon-gold across the watery face

of the bay

draws me still, standing in the street,

waiting, a word, a name perhaps,

a voice surely

working its shadow-less way

through the certainties

of breath shared

of numberless becomings,

of the myriad possible tongues recognized

in the quickening

of the heart.

**

The Sufi

After the whirling,

the young teacher,

long-time friend to our guide,

answers our questions,

while the Master,

also now in street dress,

quietly serves tea.

**

Pressing to Harran, we skirt the northern border of Syria

at the Temple of the Moon God, pre-Islamic cult

of ancient astronomers overlooking

the high, fertile plains of Mesopotamia.

They, as do we, built gates, entryways

where none was needed—how much has changed,

how much not?

**

Call to prayer fills the room,

followed by light, by the sun’s warmth

that flows through every window opened,

to every opening heart.

Urfa.

**

Gianzatep, Turkey,

one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities

in the world.

Allah has ninety-nine names. Amida Buddha, the sutras give ten.

For those who still count.

In either case, in any event

what matters, is the name in the mouth

that’s speaking it.

All else follows.