NOTE: TODAY’S POST FOLLOWS BELOW:

Dear poetry-lovers,

          Thank you from the bottom of my heart for following my blog. Some of you have been daily readers since it began 9 years ago, some are more sporadic or more recent followers.  Thank you one and all. As you can imagine, it takes a fair amount of time to write and choose both an original poem (and select a photo to pair it with from my own work.)  Besides the blog, I spend a fair amount of time finding journals and anthologies which are looking for poems to publish and I’ve been honored to be included in hundreds of them from around the world.  If my work has moved you, made you smile or laugh or feel the depth of my writing in your hearts, then my work is all the more meaningful.
          Plain View Press published my second collection of poetry, Free of the Shadow,  this month,  It has been 16 years since I’ve taken the time to gather and organize my work into a manuscript and sent it to a publisher.  I was thrilled they accepted it and the response from people who have read early copies is beyond what I hoped for.  You can find it at B&N, independent stores and at Amazon for $17.99; check it out, if you like online HERE

          But to thank you for being a follower, I am offering to send you a (signed, if you like) copy directly from me for $10.00, and I’ll pay shipping if you order it from me.  Just CLICK HERE.

Thank you again, my readers, whoever you are, one and all.

If you ask a wise teacher
to explain Zen to you,
what do you expect to hear?
If he sits before you
silent, deeply
in zazen
will you understand
his answer?

A reflection on case 3 of the Mumonkan (The Gateless Gate)