If the Doors of Perception were cleansed Everything would appear to Man as It is...Infinite

          What I great moment when two sages who lived so far apart in distance, time and cultural background bring up the same revelation. This week i broke a couple of my own rules to make and post these cards. My initial intention when i started posting this series of quotes was to post only sentences by Zen figures. However, William Blake quote is so phenomenal, that it would not fit just as note in the commentaries of Huang Po’s quote. Therefore, here it is: Huang Po and William Blake sharing the lime light.

The World is its own Magic

          

          Hopes and goals motivate me to move ahead in life. However, I am aware that hopes and goals can also drive one into a vicious cycle of dissatisfaction, if being hopeful and determination become ends in themselves. That would cost me a very high price; the price of not enjoying the good of living the life that I live right now, exchanging the life that I have for a life that may never realize. May I find a way of turning even my daily commute into a sightseeing trip.

               One of the blessings of my art is to translate and highlight to me the magic present in every moment, the miracle of simplicity and the miracle of ordinariness. May I become a better artist and love the process.

               Afraid of becoming overwordly, I’ll end this comments transcribing two quotes of very well-known poets whom the sentence on the card above reminded me.

                     The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.

                                                                                                                                                       - Marcel Proust

O see a World in a Grain of Sand

And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,

Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand

And Eternity in an hour.

- William Blake

I don't think; therefore I'm not.

This is a short sentence, but pregnant with a lot of meanings, it seems. Once more I borrowed a phrase from Sean Murphy’s “One Bird One Stone”, page, 94. It is suh spectacular book.

               The picture on the card is a black & white version of a photo found at the Buddhist Center webpage. The amazing sculpture was made by Sukhi Barber. You can see many of his other works and also her bio here.

               In my blogs, i only speak as a poet. My quest in life is to speak and live to the full extension that being a poet may allow one to do. Therefore, here i speak as a poet.

Katagiri Roshi’s quote above refers to the well unknown and over beaten Descartes’ quote “I think; therefore I am.” These days the prevalent way of being in society is in the most intimate tune with Descartes’ thought. It seems to me that the implicit suggestion of Descartes is that humans mainly experience life through thinking. The problem is that we can overemphasize the importance of thinking to the point that we confuse thought with Reality. One may even reach the point in which one thinks that one is what oneself thinks. As the last sentence shows, many times thinking can make life more complicated. Most of our limitations and suffering come through a dangerous mix of misguided thoughts and toxic emotions. That happens because thinking gives power. However, many times power causes isolation and aversion to change. That is very much against Reality that is whole interconnected and in constant change. 

               Katagiri suggestion is anti-philosophical: Do not think. Do not let yourself be limited by your own thoughts because thoughts are not Reality. Therefore, what you think you are is not real. Katagiri Roshi is saying that we can be free of the worst prison of all; the prison we most love and call home, the tower prison of “I”. Identity is made of thought. The only way of escape that prison is to let go of attachment to thoughts. Once we realize we are not what we think, and let go of attachment to overthinking, we realize the freedom that we have been all along.

Summer Grasses: All that remains of Great Soldiers' Imperial Dreams.

Photographer: Num_Skyman

Here lays

a small dead squerl

ready to become

a Rose

- Anonymous (an young boy)*

*from One Bird One Stone, pg. 168 by Sean Murphy

            Two awesome zen poems. They contrast with and complete each other at the same time. Basho says that all it remains from great soldiers' imperial dreams are summer grasses. However, maybe, he did not imply  that there is something wrong with being summer grass. What I read in this poem is a love for simplicity. In the end, a summer grass blade or bush maybe as happy or happier than a soldier chasing glory. No fights, no struggle. All a summer grass bush has to do is enjoy the summer and grow towards the sun. 

Writing about it, I can feel smell of grass exploding with life. And from the remains of dead soldiers and dead dreams, life come back strong.

            The young boy’s poem is very ingenious too. It is more pleasant to human taste. I guess most of people would chose to become a rose instead of a bush of grass. However, this seems to be one fo the very roots of human suffering:  picking and choosing. (For more great discussion on picking and choosing, see Treetop Zen Center Webpage article: The Ultimate Path is Without Difficulty. )

            As Jianzhi Sengcan says in a poem:

The Perfect Way is only difficult

For those who pick and choose.

               A rose does not choose to be a rose. A bush of grass does not choose to be a bush of grass. They are just what they are and live their lives along. The rose does not see itself in comparison to the bush of grass. The bush of grass does not compare itself to the rose. 

The renowned poet Gertrud Stein said “A rose is a rose is rose.” We can also say a bush of grass is a bush of grass is a bush of grass. However, we may not be able to say: A person is a person is a person. We humans live in comparison.  We live in comparison to other people, to what we used to be, to what we should be, to what we must be, to what we could be, to that we would be.

 It is always the could-should-would game. It is always the picking and choosing game. And it is almost always a game of suffering. It is a battle and a struggle for glory. In the end, we die and become food for grass, for roses, for worms; beings that are happy just as they are.