Can you feel the silence?

On Hyndford Street where you could feel the silence
At half past eleven on long summer nights
As the wireless played Radio Luxembourg and the voices                                                                whispered across Beechie River
And in the quietness we sank into restful slumber in silence
And carried on dreaming in God

From Van Morrison Hymns to the Silence (1991)

A retreat hut

If the meditator is able to use whatever occurs in his life as the path, his body becomes a retreat hut.

Jigme Lingpa

Green Man

 

People tend to exaggerate

People tend to exaggerate even when relating things they have actually witnessed, but when months or years have intervened, and the place is remote, they are all the more prone to invent whatever tales suit their fancies, and, when these have been written down, fictions are accepted as fact. This holds true of skill in the various arts; ignorant men who know nothing about these arts praise the masters indiscriminately, as if they were gods, but the expert gives no credence to such tales. Things known by report always prove quite different when one has actually seen them.

From Kenko, Essays in Idleness, translated by Donald Keene (New York, 1967)

You can hear their chickens ...

Small country, few people -
Hundreds of devices,
But none are used.

People ponder on death
And don’t travel far.
They have carriages and boats,
But no one goes on board;
Weapons and armour,
But no one brandishes them.
They use knotted cords for counting.

Sweet their food,
Beautiful their clothes,
Peaceful their homes,
Delightful their customs.

Neighbouring countries are so close
You can hear their chickens and dogs.
But people grow old and die
Without needing to come and go.

Lao-Tzu, Tao Te Ching, Chapter 80, translated by Stephen Addiss and Stanley Lombardo (Indianapolis, 1993)

Splintered sunlight

                                              
                                               Walk into splintered sunlight
                                               Inch your way through dead dreams
                                               to another land

                                               From Robert Hunter 'Box of Rain' (1970)

Shall we go ...

                                                Shall we go,
                                                you and I
                                                while we can?
                                                Through
                                                the transitive nightfall
                                                of diamonds

                                               From Robert Hunter, 'Dark Star' (1967)

Growing up in the forest

The pleasure of work
that produces the things we need.
The joy of the skill
of our hands and of tools well-made.
The intricate knowledge
of complex manual tasks
that look quite simple when
you master methods and risks.

Learning about plant and animal life,
the actions of people, the impact of weather.
Caring well for the habitat of each creature,
the plants, the soil and the water itself.
Living by slow cycles of growth and decay,
planning for 10,000 years, not just a day.

... moist green dark
changing
light shade
old young
growing dying
intricate web
constantly renewing ...

But after much experience and reflection outside,
he came to understand that all too many people in power
in the government and universities
carry a prejudice against the natural world -
and also against the past,
against history.

(for Gary Snyder)

A mountain abode in the city

There is an anecdote about Rikyū at the time he became Jo-o’s disciple. Rikyū went to the garden Jo-o had told him to clean, but the garden had already been thoroughly swept, and there was nothing more for him to sweep. Without hesitation, Rikyū shook a nearby tree, allowing leaves to scatter over the ground. Watching him, Jo-o is said to have praised Rikyū for his sensibility to nature despite his youth. Rikyū felt that a garden with a few leaves scattered about was more tasteful than one where they had been meticulously swept away. This example clearly reveals Rikyū’s sense of wabi. It exemplifies the “mountain abode in the city” wabi-cha ideal.

From Urasenke Chado Textbook (Kyoto, 2011)

The master’s tools

... the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. The may allow us temporarily to beat him at his own game, but they will never enable us to bring about genuine change ...

From Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider (Freedom, California, 1984)

Bursts of persistent lawn

Higher than the world

Well, I'm higher
Than the world
And I'm livin'
In my dreams
I'll make it better than it seems today

And I'm higher
Than a cloud
And I'm livin'
In a sound
I'll make it better than it seems today

Higher than the world
But my head is in a swirl
I got to give life a whirl today

Higher than the clouds
Wrapped up in a sound
I make it better all around today

Higher in my mind
I'm gonna leave these blues behind
And I'll find what I'll find today

'Cause I'm higher than the world
And I'm wrapped up in my dreams
I'll make it better than it seems today

Yes, I'm higher than the world
And I'm livin' in my mind
I got to hold on to what I find today
Just a little bit higher

From Van Morrison Inarticulate Speech of the Heart, 1983

(For Margaret)