-
RIPPLE
In this moment there is, and can be, no other. And when it is gone it never existed, much as the next will never exist. So it is with us, a reflection of the ripple of the long sunk stone now nestling the bottom of the pond.
-
DREAM WALKER
I listen for you in the night, your breathing sets the rhythm of my dreams. It was not always like this. Much as the cat craves a gentle stroking of her back, I long to trace your spine, measure each vertebra by the length of my caress, but I don’t want to pull you fitfully…
-
DAWN
Early morning Tokyo awakens, gray, moist. In the small park the crows listen for the Temple bell then bowing to the Buddha, call out their morning chants.
-
HOW IT IS
I came down out of these mountains once, emerged from clouds that built, blackened the sky, bleached and were gone, I slid on snow pack, I came down into the sage and piñon, lit my fires and purified myself. I ran with jackrabbits, imagined bears were coyote, coyotes cats that might curl in sleep…
-
CHINDI
They come down from the hills long after the sun retreats beyond Tres Piedras. In the moonless sky they creep around the pinyon, nestle the sage that blankets the mesa, stare at the scattered homes that dot the half-frozen soil. They are orange flames compressed inside orbs paired, they approach here one set, there another.…
-
LOVER
There is a moment just after the lights are turned off, when the ticking of the clock on the nightstand is amplified, reverberating off the skylights, when the heat of your body is a blanket from which I never wish to emerge.
-
GOING OVER THE BLUE CLIFF: HEKIGANROKU CASE 4
TE SHAN CARRIES HIS BUNDLE Walking in the room you cast your eyes about, looking for something, although you cannot say what it is that you look for, and you cannot believe you will not find it, for you think you will know what it is only when you see it. The person who sees…
-
MEETING BUDDHA ON THE ROAD
In my dreams last night, I thought I came across the Buddha while off wandering somewhere I could not recognize. I thought long and hard about following Linji’s prescription and killing this Buddha, but while lost in my contemplation the Buddha took up his keisaku, said, “if you cannot follow the simplest of directions, if you…
-
AKEDA
My father never walked me up a hill, never asked two servants to wait below, never bid me be strong, never asked me to have faith in the Lord, never raised the blade only to see a ram in a thicket. My father never did any of these things and so I have no special…
-
FROM BEYOND
“Call your mother,” she says. She speaks in the voice of my mother. It grates on my nerves in just the same way it always did. I listen carefully. She repeats herself. I reminded her that she died two years ago. I tell her I tried to call for months after her passing, but there…
-
Subscribe
Subscribed
Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
an old writer and his words 