A moment
then another, another
only this one
a world of delusion
yesterday and tomorrow
Buddha says Now!
Egrets take flight
we stare awestruck
nature pities us
delusion
IMAGINE THAT
You said you can only accept
what is real and tangible,
everything else
is a delusion or figment.
I cannot accept your premise
as a generalization, it eliminates
so much, for what you call real
may be otherwise to me.
And given that you are not
always present, perhaps
when you are not, when you
are not actually tangible
you are a delusion, and that
is something I can do well without:
In other words, farewell.
CALLING THE MASTER 無門關 十二
Each morning ask yourself
if it is you who is there
and answer: “Of course.”
Remind yourself
“Do not be made
a fool of today”
and assure yourself
you will not
Each morning
four selves,
each deluded, each
the fool, of one self
which is no self
free of all delusion.
A reflection on Case 12 of the Mumonkan (Gateless Gate Koans)
DEFLATED DREAMS
when did youthful dreams
slip away
erode
get consumed by
parents
teachers
or simply abandoned
reality, yours
theirs a poor substitute
all edges
and points
piercing hope
love once (a) given
rendered faint hope
worse, impossible dream
delusion? you want
to think not
want so much
can’t have
bad for you
we know good
when we give it
none for you
time
past so
grow up
ON BEING
They arrive unannounced
often not seen until
they have been among us
and won’t say how
or when they arrived.
Some claim to have seen
their arrival as they
have seen other visitors
visible only to them,
and predict their departure
with a certainty born
of a delusion or a sense
beyond the understanding.
Others say that the
are merely us in masquerade,
it is we who are deluded
for there is no arrival
by an ongoing presence.
I say nothing, for I
am one of them, just
as I am one of us, I am
recently arrived, while
I have long been here
and either you or I
may or may not be deluded.
MIRROR IMAGE
Each morning when I look
into the mirror I imagine
I see me, but of course that
is impossible, for in that moment
only the mirror sees me
and I see the mirror.
How deluded I must be
to assume that I look at all
like the mirror, but it is,
I know, just such delusions
that enable my sense of self,
and that is the grandest illusion.
A morning will come when I
look into the glass and nothing
is there or a face I have never
before seen and the mirror
will laugh, as will I, at this
game we have played for years.
WORDS, WORDS, WORDS
We are, he is convinced,
devolving into verbal neanderthals,
losing are ability to recognize
the linguistic tools that once
set us apart from other species,
or at least so we assured ourselves.
She knows that what truly sets us
apart from other species is the arcane
skill we have at being able
to convince ourselves that
delusion, firmly held, is fact.
Still, she cannot disagree with him,
simplicity is a too close cousin
to inanity, and nuance is the first
relative to be cast out. And so
with ever fewer words, we seem
to have ever more to say,
and speaking endlessly, say ever less.
LIVES
I have lived many lives,
too many to count, and I
remember bits and pieces
of each, but not necessarily
to which life this bit
or that bit should attach.
It is why I run them
together, view them
as a singularity, easier
to cope even when I
know it is a nice delusion.
I do wonder, at the moment
of death if each life will
flash by in turn, countless
short films, or if the gods
will go along with my
delusion, or maybe just
say time’s up, lights off.
SEKISO’S NOTHING IS CONCEALED 正法眼蔵 語十八
When you look in the mirror
are you real, is your reflection real?
Be careful what you say,
for if I look into that mirror
and see you, is the you I see
anything other than real?
When you go through the gate
you say “I am exiting”.
When I follow you through the gate
I say “I am entering”.
Are we both liars?
A Reflection on case 58 of the Shobogenzo (True Dharma Eye)
COSHAN’S DHARMAKAYA
He spends considerable time
looking in the mirror
trying hard to see what is there,
to see inside himself, to truly
see himself as he imagines others see him.
The mirror denies him a static image,
it is always shifting, and try
though he might to grasp one single image
he finds it impossible and always
gives up in frustration. Still
he tries again the next day,
and the next after that, never
attaining his desired objective.
Ask yourself, what is his failure?
If he would become the mirror,
then, and only then, he might see himself,
rather than a mere image on glass.
