#KiyiyaVuranInsanlik 

               (Humanity Washed Ashore) 

                                                              

                                                    for Octavio Paz                                          

                                    (though we differed in our politics)

How the empty imprint of 3-year-old Alan Kurdi’s dead body

Found its way from the surf near Bodrum, Turkey’s shore 

To a sandbar on my local river I’ll never know — technology

And ‘hand of god’, both — both images now indelible

In memory. The sand along Turkey’s shore has been washed — 

Thousands of times over — with Aegean salt water. And the guard 

Who lifted and carried the then-nameless toddler’s body away, 

May unspeakably be having breakfast with his wife, the horror of dead bodies 

Washing up on shore having been rendered mute by their numbers. 

I, too, have had to find a way to go on with — in spite, not along with —

The business of life within this mesh of powers. How do we

Find ourselves, though alive, somehow too face-down in sand. 

More than five years after September 2, 2015 and the headlines 

Have yet to change. According to the London-based Syrian Observatory 

For Human Rights, Biden ordered retaliatory airstrikes that killed at least 22  

Within weeks of his inauguration. While Trump was building a wall 

Along the Mexican border, the creative memory of Syrian revolutionaries

Deterritorialized and archived the revolution by building the Idlib Walls —

A reminder a government’s overreaction to a group of boys painting 

Murals on their school walls sparked a revolution that has yet to end. 

The most recent addition to the Idlib Walls includes a mural for 

George Floyd — Idlib shouts “No To Racism” out to everywhere and 

Nowhere in spite of cultural differences and massive economic inequalities 

Giving rise to opposing movements of deterritorialization and 

Tightening borders. Everywhere the story’s the same — “white” people 

Afraid of losing the identities that allow them to pass through unquestioned,

While absconding with the identities of others — the islands of Lesbos, Kos, 

Manus othered geographies of organized abandonment. Whoever heard

Of states willingly ceding, rather than conquering and colonizing, land? In February 

2021, one hundred thousand were detained at the Mexican border. Worldwide, 

Over eighty million have been displaced from their homes, twenty-six million 

Are refugees living abroad. Countries are now actively engaging in

Explusions in defiance of the 1951 Refugee Convention.  Life rafts 

At sea, emptied of fuel, bob listlessly on water reflecting an other-worldly

Sunlight, the surface glistening with dislocations produced by

Life-shattering formations that are beyond the legally recognized

Responsibility of systems. The tether to where I live too tenuous to hold me,

On one island the shores are lined with abandoned life-jackets. On another,

Oil slicks. On another, the skeletons of eroded and ruptured civilization.

 

 

 

 

 

Link to the Idlib Walls - https://creativememory.org/en/idlib-walls/idlib-walls-timeline/

More info - https://artistsatriskconnection.org/story/creative-memory-of-the-syrian-revolution

A Poem: Choreography of Negative Space ...& the Four Vows

Choreography of Negative Space


What is this dance if not a whisper of shape
Tracing words in the dark. A trail of light on film.
A shift of air, as gentle as...

Silk.

Imagination is endless. The shadows we are
Cast ten thousand resolutions, each more beautiful,
Or terrifying, than the last -- wisps that escape
Our confinement.

We sit the universe and the universe moves --

Ancients rise up, stretching
Skin over the drums of time and the bones
Of dreams spent in the building of this

Space.

Without space, the forms collapse
Themselves, themselves unseen.

Each night I light a candle and sit for you.



These are the Four Vows:

Beings are numberless, I vow to free them.
Delusions are inexhaustible, I vow to end them.
Dharma gates are boundless, I vow to enter them.
The buddha way is unsurpassable, I vow to realize it.


...Noticing I'm still walking in circles these days.

A Poem: For September

September skies and a mist hanging over the grass tug me back towards the lost and lonely, though that isn't exactly the truth.

Something in me knows the time will soon come to wave goodbye one by one to all things summer, reposition the clothes in the closet, all the while recognizing I have not divested myself of enough.

The small losses are a sonar against which I ping.

I count my blessings only to trade them. I count my blessings to give them away.

Prayer flags flap in the blue skies of higher altitudes and I ask what are the essential fictions?

After all these years solitude is a well-worn jacket I stuff my fists into. My favorite. The first one hanging ready on the peg.

I will set out my boots for a serious waterproofing.

It's a bit of a contradiction, but the crisp air of September departures encourages my presence as the one who remains.

A Poem: The Sun at One O'Clock

Found in the memory of that day,
Is a moment, a point in time when
The sun stood still,
A precise moment when the sun,
Suspended at one o'clock, expanded in sky
And became, of itself, eternity.

All color was washed out
By the brightness that is sun.
At the sea wall, painted with graffiti
And cracked by quake some years before,
Fishermen stood, still as statues, tribute
To the reality of sun's substance and sustenance.
The sea became glass that slowly rolled,
Brighter than bright, and the whiteness of gulls,
That whiteness that is not white, became shadow
Then vanished into all that is sun.

In that moment day was consumed
By everything sun, the sun
Turning back on itself, announcing
And echoing an immeasurable This -
The precise moment when
The sun was at one o'clock.

A Poem: Recall the Sound that Water Makes

Recall the sounds that water makes ―
The slow hiss, pop and sputter of water
Moving up a faucet, long disused, or
The steadiness inherent in chaotic drip
That would threaten some to madness.

Or, should you prefer, the multitude of sounds
That accompany torrential rains in summer,
Pelting splatters on a sidewalk, roaring swirls
Along roadsides brown with mud, torn leaves,
And assorted broken bits, or yet,
The softer sound of hot steam rising
Off sunstruck rooftops like smoke.

Yet none of these is the true sound
Of water, which makes no sound at all,
But is transformed to sound
By movement, movement to and movement from,
The sound of subject and object in collision, the sound
Of the erosion of differences, until there is
Not a single grain of sand left.

Reflections: Sensibility, a Poem

While I was at Antaiji I didn't have the freedom to respond to the calling of a poem. Due to scheduling I had to keep the 'lid on' most of the times when I felt a longer poem 'surfacing'. 

So maybe its not a surprise that the poem that follows gave me a lot of material for self-inquiry. I doubt I’m done with that, but feel there's been enough to post it now.

            Sensibility

There are times, like the time
Approaching a change in season,

When the air carries with it
A memory we had no intention
Of calling up or recalling
From our adult deportment.

And so, unbidden, perhaps even
Against our will, the air marks
Our movement, imagined or real,
With the shadow of a thought
And a sting of sadness or regret
For what we think we’ve lost –
A bit of joy, a bit of laughter –
Nothing special, nothing really major.

But the air gasps as we walk by.
Sun dapples the leaves, 'still green',
We say, as if to reassure,
Walking in that way, no break
In stride, the way we've learned
To seem to ignore, but watch alertly
From the corner of our eye,
With the curiosity of the foreigners
That we are, the old guy
Wearing a donated fur in summer
sitting, half-toppled over,

On his cardboard box mattress.

A butterfly flutters from flower to flower
And disappears in the tall
Grasses, burnt to straw by the dry heat
Of August. The woman who watches
Is as far removed from childhood
As Pluto from the sun, so there
Is no chase, but also, no chance
For a skinned knee. Her fingers instead
Reach to grasp and twist
A bit of fabric from her skirt.

Is it a miracle of light that we see
Or a miracle of sight that there is light?
What worth has sight
Without a bit of wistfulness
For the promise of a solar system
That never existed or is just out of reach
By some arbitrary definition
Of a void so very real.

For me, the poem touches on Zen practice -- both what it is and what it's not.

The void is real. It is infinite, has no boundaries, is ineffable, and can't be filled. Many people spend their whole lives trying to escape (like my own attempt to 'run' from this poem) or fill the void. Society teaches us strategies from an early age, but those strategies often end in disappointment and turn us into ‘the woman watching’. Society lies to us, tries to define the void, tells us it has limits, "If you manage to do x, y, z successfully, the void will be filled." Well, we're typically not successful. And even if we are, the sense of fulfillment doesn’t stay with us, so we excuse that by saying we weren't successful enough or that success is our birthright, expected, and move on to the next challenge. And the lie gets propagated.

Zen practice also can turn us into ‘the woman watching’ if we're not careful, because its a practice of restraint. We start with zazen or sitting to rewire our brains and hearts. Although its a practice of restraint, we're told the outcome is supposed to make us free. But we can get stuck in the desire for freedom and we can get stuck in self-denial.

What is free? Certainly not ‘the woman watching’ who's either kind of dead or anxious inside. Nor is it the children who might chase a butterfly, although a ‘child-like’ approach seems to be part of it.

As practitioners of Zen, we face the void. We let go and drop into it. We find the void is infinite, has no boundaries, is ineffable, and includes everything, even or especially ourselves. And a major source of the void is a sense of exclusion.

What happens after? Reality. Life goes on… Practice goes on...

A Poem: Homage for a Friend

Dedicated to my three favorite poets on Twitter, those many faces on Twitter...you know who you are! (One of them may not consider himself a poet, but I have enjoyed his poetry and Haiku for their simple perspective and their perspective on Zen practice.) Gratitude for your friendship and assistance on my path to awakening. Namaste and Peace. May you be well and happy. _/|\_

This piece was originally written ~February 20th, 2010

Sit and observe a moment.
Let the air come in and circulate

Through those dusky places.
Just listen, for instance, to that lone field sparrow

Who forgetting all humility awakens out of itself
And sings a bit more loudly than the rest.
That song is a bit of something,

A song to take peace in, a harbinger, yes,

of spring
Which comes to us all, just like every season.

It's all too common to let those moments blur,
All that simple song turning into
Ambient noise to be brushed aside,
Along with the sounds of traffic,
Which themselves are a kind of peace
In the world continuing if you listen.
How strange it is that sounds and colours
Can be so equally intense, how every feature seems
To take on some monumental significance
When viewed from either side of love

― joy or sorrow.

It's still our winter now though,
And though the daylight extends its arms

Ever further into night, there's still time for us

To build that fire based on honesty and friendship.

Let's all gather round like the old birds that we are

― gathering blackberries.

Link to the Robert Hass poem "Meditation at Lagunitas" to which this poem refers.

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field. I'll meet you there.

When the soul lies down in that grass,
the world is too full to talk about.

Ideas, language, even the phrase each other
doesn't make any sense. ~ Rumi

A Poem: Contemplation on a Word

Wherever it is that souls go

When our bodies have burned

Through their time alotted ―

Which is such a small fragment

Of eternity, that our small suffering

And pain should hardly matter

Relatively speaking, that ephemeral

They are ― I am already part

There and stand with you

Even during those moments

You forget your origins ―

So what, if my head

Is occasionally in the clouds.

If you ever stop to feel a presence

Beside you in those moments

When frustration, impatience,

Fear, greed, or anger overwhelm you

With conditions and circumstances,

Maybe that is me, or that part of me

That matters, but is not matter.

More likely its all of us though,

Standing together, the small story

That is humanity forgotten,

Merely echoes, in the solid love

That is Always.

A Poem: The Note of Now

It only takes one note,

this song of love I sing for you,

the note of now that resonates

each atom, the insides of which

spin in embrace of all that is,

and even all of you.

That note will reach you

across this timelessness

from wherever I sit —

my whole being this one note.

A Poem: Rediscovering Stevens

That voice was still there,

Though she hadn't pulled
That dog-eared book from it's box
That had been locked with chains
And locked with locks,
So deep it was,

His cry, in the early wind
Of dusk. No other poet
Had ever made her cry so much.

Link to: Not Ideas About the Thing but the Thing Itself by Wallace Stevens

A Poem: For Grace

Published on my niece Grace's birthday and dedicated with love to all members of my extended family, but particularly my father and mother. A heartfelt thank you to my family and my many teachers, both experiences and people, for their contributions to my life which do not go unrecognized. Namaste.

She knew heaven.

It touched and moved her,

Air around her arms,

earth beneath her feet.

Years passed as days might pass.

Clouds drifted across skies,

Sometimes cirrus wisps,

sometimes, after the great storms of summer,

Pillars of cumulus, colored in the pinks and yellows

Of sunrise and sunset.

Some days fog wrapped her in warm humidity

And there were times of pure heat from days of sun.

There was night and the waxing and waning of moons.

She watched sparks flicker in the air and earth,

Listened to the humming movements

of insects

and creatures

That chattered in unknown languages.

Leaves rustled in whispers

that traced movements under brittle cover

and further

Delved into the decaying detritus.

She knew these,

not by their names,

But by their innocence. There was beauty.

There was suffering.

Not being separate from either,

she knew neither

In it's separate forms.

The distinctions we might hew and tender

were absent,

And her eyes tendered a calm

no vision or wind could ripple.

She grew from the ground in a reversal of eons

that weighted tedious.

An accumulation of sand and pebble

and ragged shards of rock

Burned and molted back into wholeness -

the fragments of our exiles

Reunited in cosmic glistening.

What was it that bore and birthed her

from everlastingness?

Of us, for us, her longing

that she could not sing the rightness of it,

The way the birds could sing,

picking up where they left off

After each passing storm.

So slowly, in years or moments,

she lifted that weight

and constricted her abdomen,

Breathing in and directing the shape that she was up,

first whispering,

then a hum,

And then deepening the vibration

until the hum became a note, a lullaby,

a blessing.

To rise and rising,
first buffeted, then carried

on that great wind, ever towards us, that rose,

no longer becalmed, but at peace.

A Poem: On the Perpetual Motion of the Mind

In writing a form, lush in its recognized transience,

We try to sense the clarity forever falling past us

On a screen of life, love, and wanting. The act itself defies,

Is at once a holding and a release, born of all that is humanity,

Spinning itself out into the dust of the imagined Universe.

We were there once, now we were there again, we will be there,

But it slips into non-existence, a specter that haunts if we pause

To recognize the process of creation. We cup our lost stars briefly

And spill them out on tables, like a rolling of dice.

This is the reality where one of the dice rocks briefly

before it dips into its resting place:

Which is where the painter's hand forgets its motion

And becomes the painting and something previously unimagined is realized.

Which is where bodies rock together, for a moment outside of the realm

Of possibilities, disappearing the mind in shared sensation.

Which is the strangers that are us pausing outside a shop window,

Christmas lights sparkling and reflected back at every possible angle,

But they look past the reflection at emptiness. On either side there is form.

Which is that future where we have been and no longer are.

Which is that moment of dawn when the sky is still yellow around the edges

And the trees are thick black strokes propped on their elbows, blinking

In amazement at the beginning of another decade

in the middle of the clamor bringing in a New Year as it moved us

Into the past, circling the globe, which circles the sun, which circles

Something, like the mind circles, but never returns to quite the same place.

This is letting go of form, a place where words run out of any power

They ever had to describe, and the mind finally rests in the arms of what,

For lack of better words, is everything home has ever meant.

Luke House

Sandbar at the junction of the Magdelina & Bogota Rivers, Colombia (2005)

The drink offered is Chicha, in this case yucca, chewed by the local women, fermented, & brewed.

(Note: I did not partake. Today, I would and probably laugh.

I sense a post about Colombia in the near future.)

Menzan's Kinhin

What are words, but a broken structure

that we try to build into something

that remotely resembles

what we feel?

The words are not enough,

there is so much more to sound.

So take the words apart,

their syllables in pieces then,

laid out on the floor

to be mixed

and matched

by some sixth sense towards

a meaning.

And still the meanings escape us.

So we go and break it down

some more,

into the individual

vowels and consonants.

The 'O' of glory, or the smaller 'o',

a sound of pain.

The 'i' of infinity

breaking into the 'I' of individuals.

Each separate sound

distinctly held

against the harsh sounds of consonants

that snap,

like the trunk of a tree.

These sounds we can comprehend

remotely

and in slow motion,

though it may take days or years

to sink in.

To re-assemble

the sounds, syllables and words,

so that sentences

once again flow smoothly

from our mouths.

Last Tuesday I took the opportunity to volunteer at a soup kitchen in Madison, where I live. The Madison Zen Center, along with 30-40 other local organizations contribute food and their services, one day a month each, to provide meals for the homeless in our area. We all encounter homeless people on a daily basis as we go about our lives. My reactions differ depending on the person and circumstance, but I am usually confused as to what to do. Should I look them in the eye and smile? Should I give them money? Do they want the money for food, transportation, or drink? Should I just walk by pretending I don't see them when I really do?, etc. One thing that is pretty consistent though, is that I get a "There but by the grace of God go I" feeling (~ John Bradford quote). While I was living in New Haven in the 90's, there were a lot of homeless around. In the downtown area, they acted as guardians for those of us at the University who walked by them on a regular basis. They were guardians, or maybe just witnesses, against a more dangerous criminal element. Some of them became friends of a sort, to exchange a smile or a few words with now and then.

"You must look into people as well as at them," -Philip Chesterfield

"But I know that I love thee, whatever thou art." -Thomas Moore

Luke House: 3 'rules' of operation:
#1) The harder everyone works, the poorer people become.

#2) Service reinforces privilege,
#3) Never do a job alone.
There was a fourth in retrospect, #4) only do the job you are given.

When I arrived at the Luke House, full of enthusiasm, a member of my Sangha gave me bags of salad fixings to mix together. That job quickly finished, I was at a loss. I was searching for things to do and getting frustrated, until I was introduced to the Director who explained the rules of operation. The 'don't work too hard', suggested by #1 is contrary to everything I have been taught. It doesn't make sense to me even now, except in the context of #2 and a Buddhist concept 'doing less, is sometimes more' or 'let the doing do itself.' To keep myself from helping out with other things (#4) while I was standing around was also tough having done my share of waitressing in my teen years. The third rule, 'Never do a job alone", may have its exceptions, but the joy of sharing work with others is something I learned early in my childhood and resonates strongly for me.

The most humbling experience of the evening entailed sitting down to eat. Volunteers take turns sitting down to eat as people get served, one or two volunteers per table. Before folks sit down, a concierge asks them about portion sizes for the main dish, signals the servers and food is brought out. Then everyone is seated. Two designated servers walk around serving milk, bread, and later, desert. I got to serve the desert, which was fun, and gave me a chance to interact a bit with those willing. Then all of a sudden it was my turn to sit down and eat. I was asked my perferred portion size and directed to a table just like everyone else. At the table, I didn't know what to say or ask. The fellow sitting on my right offered me milk, bread, salad dressing, etc. and I accepted and thanked him. But immediately after, he got up out of his seat and asked to be moved to another table -- the only instance of this I saw all night. I have no idea what I did wrong. After this, I did not try to speak anymore -- decided to think of this more like a meal during sesshin or other type of meditation retreat.

As simple as the evening was all-in-all, I was contented when I left Luke House that evening. I think it had to do with the minimal, but pleasant exchanges between people while eating and the occasional smiles on many of faces at various points through the night. There were families there, parents, babies and toddlers, and I have never seen them so well behaved. I include the parents in that statement. And yes, the homeless include babies and toddlers, especially in this economy. I don't know where these families keep themselves, I normally don't encounter them here in Madison, so I have to admit this was a big wake-up call for me.

*Luke House 310 S Ingersoll St Madison, WI 53703-3739 is run on donations and is a real community builder. After reading this review, I cried: http://www.yelp.com/biz/luke-house-madison.

"No duty is more urgent than that of returning thanks." -Saint Ambrose