Wordlessly
Tongues are wagging, pundits of every stripe
flooding the market with worldly wisdom.
And what advice are we gleaning
from the wisest people on the planet –
the accomplished, the expert, the scholarly,
the lauded, the powerful and famous?
Do they proclaim foremost
the sovereignty and reality of God?
There is nothing to know, said my Lord.
Wordlessly transmitted (say the Mystics),
Truth is neither spoken nor heard.
Neither spoken nor heard. Only experienced.
O child of God, your daily fill of data
has nothing to do with Truth.
The answer
The problem with this poetry
is that it’s riddled with words –
a conundrum shot full of holes;
a leaky vessel letting in, perhaps,
a scattering of light but sinking
ultimately under the weight
of its own inconsistencies.
I want to wash my hands of it;
wash my mouth out with soap,
but I’m stuck like ink to the page.
The riddle’s inside me and there’ll be
no peace until it’s solved, the answer
shining through each contradiction
in all its inexpressible glory.
O child of God, what is there to say?
Truth is not comprised of explanations.
An icy stream
Thoughts come and go.
I acknowledge them,
more with a nod than an embrace,
remaining attentive to the task at hand,
the focus always upon my simply being.
The mind, again and again,
being led back from where it strays –
to the peace, the posture, the breath and senses.
Like men crossing an icy stream – how cautious!
avowed Lao Tzu, speaking of the old sages,
minds ever upon the task and just how and where
their feet are positioned amid the rushing water.
To allow their attention to roam during
this critical passage is to court disaster.
O child of God, rather than write
about zazen, ardently practice it.
Seventy-one
In this dream (per Meher), today is my birthday.
It doesn’t feel like I’ve dreamed myself
for seventy-one years.
It’s more like
I’ve dreamed, upon waking this morning,
that I am seventy-one; dreamed my identity
and tacitly all that’s gone before.
No abiding self, said the Buddha, and at times
the idea has struck me that I’m never older
than a mere millisecond.
And never will be.
Anyway, I threw a party with cake and candles
and in the midst of the celebration,
I pretended to be an old man.
O child of God, ignorant yourself of absolutely everything,
why not embrace a faith in the Knower of all?
