when what needs to be
said
can’t be
one needs to
say
nothing
clearly
haiku
This is the Last Day of April is Poetry Month!
I sat “virtually” with the sangha last night. It’s becoming a regular Wednesday night thing with the Oak tree in the Garden.
A “sangha” is a gathering of Zen practitioners.
I am finding myself slipping in to some very dark places, and not the actual ones that I should, like the one under the stairs that could use some cleaning and reorganizing. Instead I am slipping into a place where I get lost in thoughts that propagate really paralyzing inertia and despair.
It is good to commit to practicing with others. I doesn’t matter the context. The important thing is to just sit practicing Zazen. Which is the context of ‘NO CONTEXT’, (forget about getting your intellect around that!)
I’ve done a lot of sitting lately, lounging actually.
But sitting Zazen we gradually gain (or regain, again and again) the ability to see thoughts arise and dissipate. We learn how to return to this breath and this moment.
And you can also clean out the space under the stairs this way, although, dust bunnies, spiders…that homemade mask is going to come in handy.
Here is one last poem for the month, rewritten.
Sadness Haiku
Awakening
the jeweled dew glistens
in the morning light.
haiku
Even sadness comes
as jeweled dew glistening
in the morning light
Visual Haiku
APAD
Poems drip from shelves
filled with half realized dreams
mopped up by poets.
As A POEM A DAY month draws to an end, and I have NOT successfully managed to come even close to writing or sharing a poem a day, this one spilled on to the page, or the screen in this case…
Be kind, it is very young and innocent.
one last poem for the road…
Haiku: Writer’s Block
If there is no poem
where did it not come from and
can I go there too?
A Poem A Day, Day Twenty-eight
Two Years of Rengas
three moths spiral
into the blue sky –
summer clouds over hills
the drone of male cicadas
background sound for a hot day
shimmering heat hazy
reflecting the blue horizon –
cooling wet puddles
the hiss of steel in water
awakens the sleeping dog
the old dog stretches
paws, claws and back a line –
warm winter corner
i must have fallen asleep
making two seasons vanish
the sky gets lighter
as the sun begins to rise
–morning already?
a stand of skinny gum trees
breaks the hill’s smooth silhouette
mirroring the trees
shadows dance; winds gently blow
across cool mornings
jeweled in dew the flowers
loose thier fragrance for the bees
A Poem A Day, Day Thirteen
Branches like brush strokes
painted on a burning sky
framed by days ending.
A Poem a Day, Day Seven
Waking
No meat.
The bones of a dream
fall away.
A Poem a Day, Day Six
Sakyamuni
always raising the flower,
cat always smiling.
Words About 