Above Buckeye Canyon…
the last of the clouds lift from my eyes
to let the sky fall
to me
in it.
Cumulus gone, hawks circle
dreams flashing white
glints of red
around
my own raised head, circling
sky like a dream, like
they say, like
in a dream
blue sky
calling
home
**
Tell me of your true teachers,
called so more for time spent
than words said.
**
I’m glad to accept the offer—I sense
the attempt to not hinder with obligation
decision willingly made—all of us, together,
a collective of singularities, singular integrities
in a world supporting all, each their own worth
in their own time, integral, essential and whole
expressions of the whole.
No thought of ought—the way it is
to begin with—free.
**
Earthling, have you noticed how pines
hold morning’s retreating darkness longest,
how crows prefer the tops of pines
and long telephone lines,
how the moon, even in the midst
of its long winter work,
makes time illumine every face it faces ?
**
Everything that comes our way
makes a difference we bring back
into the world that brought it our way
in the first place, a cumulative project,
always underway, always now,
nothing lost, everything
always spoken for.
Looking from here, I can’t remember
anymore, what it was I ever thought
was needed.
**
For a moment this morning,
I lost the moon behind dusting clouds—
there, then gone, then there again. And
I wonder, for the moon, is the opposite true,
if for it, we are ever lost?
**
Unfinished promises
fall like trackless snow
fallen light on early streets
smoothed luminous clean
and quietly waiting someone
who knows
it’s time.
**
I do my best, even from my wife,
to hide the extent of my idleness.
But since you’ve asked…
that poet William Stafford called a poem
a group of words that catches your attention
just so—anyone, either side a particular bunch
of words, can make valid determination—no
restrictions apply—no anti here, no handles there
to help you see what you think you hear—traceless,
yet real, like breathing—Ryokan, before Stafford,
refused to speak of his poems as poetry; he simply
wrote his mind—and Han Shan before him,
brushed his ink on stones and boulders,
left poems where found, to fend for themselves,
then wandered around for more.
All these years, all this fuss, over nothing.
See what I mean?
**
Yet another morning after…
Bodhisattvas sometimes appear
who help us reaffirm our center.
Although this is not always pleasant,
neither is compassion
always what we’d thought it would be.
**
Local
Rain-ponchos swirl around legs
swept with shadows, silhouette trees
drink moistened pavement
and pools of silent street-lamp light
wait for morning. Where is “here” for you,
the poet’s essay asks and means,
your “watershed”—words you know
you should know, that shed your shoulders
like rivulets of another’s language,
words that say, nonetheless, that something
that needs to be said.
**
In this world today, one effective counter
to successive preemptive attacks of chaos
might well be equally scatter-shot:
multiple random acts, unrelenting flows
of individual gestures, of kindness,
from all of us, to everyone, everywhere—
“love beyond flags” of any stripe or color.
**
Lost in thought, rain drops
wrinkle awake shuddering bamboo,
dripping winter blossoms
waver the breeze
and the last of evening’s light
lingers at the window
whispering secrets
of spring—-
**
The almond tree
in the front along the street,
pushes buds
in every direction,
always bursts to blossom
first—this year, today,
in a break in the rain.
**
One of my teachers once said,
once you get it, don’t keep talking
about it—that’s not it.
The boat bumps the opposite shore
to signal time to get off—a wave
of thanks is sufficient.
Looking back too long doesn’t help
adjustment here—early suggestions
of loneliness are intimations
of independence: keep walking.
**
Saturday morning’s moon rests full
above the west horizon, almost gold
against an ink blue sky gone blank,
the last of the stars’ sparkled promises
forgotten, the palm of the bowl on the altar
holding prayers like incense
offered to a circling world, to the mystery
of the reach and the burn of air.
**
Surprised by the arrival
of sunlight, clouds hovering the ridge
blush, then reach for the pale blue veil
of this, the world’s newest day.
**
Aromatic yellow flowers adorn the altar,
augment rain-drenched skies, petals
sounding sunlight’s presence.
**
Last night’s storm
leaves a blanket
of almond snow-flakes
that track into the house
but do not melt.
**
In the dark of early morning streets,
reviewing the past, the myriad signals
heeded, those ignored, those understood,
those not—the puzzle of loneliness
slowly unfolding the wonders and joy
of solitude—at every end, a beginning.
**
For a moment, clouds make room
for sunlight’s reach, then close again
for shadow.
A break is all it takes for insight.
***
“No one knows I’m sitting here alone.
A solitary moon shines
in the cold spring.”
Han Shan
trans. Burton Watson
