vimalakīrti speaks of the fundamental existential malaise of all sentient beings

 

 If you want to go to the pure land,

Then purify your mind. 

When your mind is pure,

Then whatever you see will be pure

And wherever you go

You will find the Buddha realm.

-- from Vimalakirtinirdesa Sutra

 Chapter 4

The bodhisattva Mañjuśrī (conventionally understood as the embodiment of supreme wisdom) is persuaded by the Buddha to visit Vimalakīrti, albeit with some difficulty. Vimalakīrti miraculously transforms his apparently narrow and humble abode into a vast cosmic palace, thus creating enough space for the throng Mañjuśrī has brought with him. Vimalakīrti explains his illness in spiritual terms, equating it with the fundamental existential malaise of all sentient beings. According to this discourse, the true cure for all ills is also spiritual, and involves the achievement of states of non-self and non-dualism.  wikipedia, Vimalakirti Sutra

In the VIMALAKIRTI NIRDESA SUTRA, Translated by Robert A. F. Thurman , this fragment from chapter 4:

Then, the Buddha said to the bodhisattva Maitreya, "Maitreya, go to the Licchavi Vimalakirti to inquire about his illness."  

 

"'Therefore, Maitreya, do not fool and delude these deities! No one abides in, or regresses from, enlightenment. Maitreya, you should introduce these deities to the repudiation of all discriminative constructions concerning enlightenment. 

 

"'Enlightenment is perfectly realized neither by the body nor by the mind. Enlightenment is the eradication of all marks. Enlightenment is free of presumptions concerning all objects. Enlightenment is free of the functioning of all intentional thoughts. Enlightenment is the annihilation of all convictions. Enlightenment is free from all discriminative constructions. 

 

Enlightenment is free from all vacillation, mentation, and agitation. Enlightenment is not involved in any commitments. Enlightenment is the arrival at detachment, through freedom from all habitual attitudes. The ground of enlightenment is the ultimate realm. Enlightenment is realization of reality. Enlightenment abides at the limit of reality. 

 

Enlightenment is without duality, since therein are no minds and no things. Enlightenment is equality, since it is equal to infinite space. 

 

"'Enlightenment is unconstructed, because it is neither born nor destroyed, neither abides nor undergoes any transformation. Enlightenment is the complete knowledge of the thoughts, deeds, and inclinations of all living beings. Enlightenment is not a door for the six media of sense. 

 

Enlightenment is unadulterated, since it is free of the passions of the instinctually driven succession of lives. 

 

Enlightenment is neither somewhere nor nowhere, abiding in no location or dimension. 

 

Enlightenment, not being contained in anything, does not stand in reality. Enlightenment is merely a name and even that name is unmoving. Enlightenment, free of abstention and undertaking, is energyless. There is no agitation in enlightenment, as it is utterly pure by nature. Enlightenment is radiance, pure in essence. Enlightenment is without subjectivity and completely without object. 

 

Enlightenment, which penetrates the equality of all things, is undifferentiated. Enlightenment, which is not shown by any example, is incomparable. Enlightenment is subtle, since it is extremely difficult to realize. Enlightenment is all-pervasive, as it has the nature of infinite space. 

 

Enlightenment cannot be realized, either physically or mentally. Why? The body is like grass, trees, walls, paths, and hallucinations. And the mind is immaterial, invisible, baseless, and unconscious.' 

 

"Lord, when Vimalakirti had discoursed thus, two hundred of the deities in that assembly attained the tolerance of birthlessness. As for me, Lord, I was rendered speechless. Therefore, I am reluctant to go to that good man to inquire about his illness."

https://www2.kenyon.edu/Depts/Religion/Fac/Adler/Reln260/Vimalakirti.htm

It’s lucky I am not enlightened. 

My illness is mundane and uncomplicated.

I’m comfortable with no arrival and no departure.

While researching Vimalakirti I am listening to a book. 

The book is After (A Doctor Explores What Near Death Experiences Reveal About Life and The Beyond), (2021) by Psychiatrist Bruce Greyson MD. 

(About which more later.)

I listen to birds between Ragged and Bald Mountains,

A slight breeze --

This first of July.

sum eundam nusquam

 I am going nowhere

I am going

Nowhere

I am

Going

Now

Here

just fine in plenty of other moments

Yeah, maybe something like this: 

Using the Tralfamadorian passivity of fate, Pilgrim learns to overlook death and the shock involved with death. He claims the Tralfamadorian philosophy on death to be his most important lesson:

The most important thing I learned on Tralfamadore was that when a person dies he only appears to die. He is still very much alive in the past, so it is very silly for people to cry at his funeral. All moments, past, present, and future, always have existed, always will exist. ... When a Tralfamadorian sees a corpse, all he thinks is that the dead person is in bad condition in that particular moment, but that the same person is just fine in plenty of other moments. Now, when I myself hear that somebody is dead, I simply shrug and say what the Tralfamadorians say about dead people, which is "So it goes."^[23] 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slaughterhouse-Five

That’s probably it.

That and war’s utter absurdity and idiotic cruelty.

verhältnismäßigkeit

 I’ve seen photos

The universe is very very big —

How silly earthlings are

Give trump all the money he craves,

I’ve seen his photos

He is very very small

dove la poesia è salvezza

the air is still

quiet and hot

once I taught

morality and ethics

now I read and listen

to what seems perversion

and immorality. It seems

I had it wrong, might is right

the powerful and rich can do

anything they want to do --

I should have taught poetry

I should have taught mysticism

there, at least, a sense of wonder

there, at last, genuine absurdity

where many arrivals make us live

and the woman on the 13th floor

hanging from her window reascends

bees make their way home

where nobility of soul is no longer

at odds with circumstance

the fact of it

 two AM

I would stay

up later

but I don’t --

a good moon

through trees

uno sciocco e il suo spirito si separano presto

 If I were

a poet

I’d write poetry

But I am a fool

so I write

foolishness

Uno sciocco e il suo spirito 

si separano presto

(a fool and his wit

are soon separated)

ただここに座っているだけ

 I sit

staring at nothing 

these days

no noise

going nowhere

a lethargy of stillness

nothing to emulate

just debris

a scatter of fallen things

newspapers, magazines

cat-clawed boxes

a bag of pistachios

having lost my taste

I’m content 

ただここに座っているだけ

Tada koko ni suwatte iru

(just

sitting here)

άσεμνος, αναξιοπρεπής

 If

God

Then

Creation

If no

God

Then

Decoration

Be wary of

Decorous delusion

If lunacy

then great sorrow

άσεμνος, αναξιοπρεπής

indecent, undignified

an American

presidency

lest the parade of our mutual life get lost in the dark

 One of three tonight at practice:

A Ritual to Read to Each Other

If you don't know the kind of person I am

and I don't know the kind of person you are

a pattern that others made may prevail in the world

and following the wrong god home we may miss our star.

For there is many a small betrayal in the mind,

a shrug that lets the fragile sequence break

sending with shouts the horrible errors of childhood

storming out to play through the broken dike.

And as elephants parade holding each elephant's tail,

but if one wanders the circus won't find the park,

I call it cruel and maybe the root of all cruelty

to know what occurs but not recognize the fact.

And so I appeal to a voice, to something shadowy,

a remote important region in all who talk:

though we could fool each other, we should consider—

lest the parade of our mutual life get lost in the dark.

For it is important that awake people be awake,

or a breaking line may discourage them back to sleep;

the signals we give — yes or no, or maybe —

should be clear: the darkness around us is deep.

— Poem by William E. Stafford (1914-1993)

The joy of poetry! 

non, sequitur

 I will not run the NYC marathon this year.

                    Have you ever?

No.

                    Thanks for sharing your decision.

Sure. I’m going to rest now.

each illustrates

It’s hard at times to know if we are coming or going.

Our temporal world is saying hello and goodbye each second, each appearance and disappearance.

A final drop of dew 

 

Or the first sparkling leaf; 

 

Each illustrates 

 

This brief temporal world 

 

Through which all things pass.

--Sojo Henjo (816-890)

It seems silly to build monuments to what has been.

Equally unnecessary to herald with proleptic anticipation what could be.

Here’s what I think as I sit here: this breath is all I have, and I don’t even have that.

It is equally meaningful to say ‘God is good!’ as it is to say 'There are crab cakes and three-bean salad in the refrigerator.’

The first is my life.

The second is my life.

As you, too, are my life.

nomenclator -- solipsistas inexpresiva

I suppose we’re still at it.

So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds in the sky and all the wild animals. But for Adam no suitable helper was found.  Genesis 2:20 New International Version

Someone has to do it. 

Nomenklatur: A person who invents or assigns names, as in scientific classification. 1555–65; < Latin nōmenclātor, variant of nōmenculātor one who announces names, equivalent to nōmen name + -culātor, variant of calātor a crier ( calā ( re ) to call + -tor -tor) https://latin-words.com/word/latin/nomenclatura

I have a description for the occupant of the White House and his unappetizing sycophants. 

solipsistas de mirada inexpresiva, con una ausencia carente de vida e indiferente

blank-eyed solipsists, with a lifeless and indifferent absence

Let’s call them solipsistas inexpresiva.

It’s the dead-eyed faction of the uncaring nihilists. They have become the model of political nihilism wherein no one outside their ideological and self-aggrandizing circle has any worth or relevance.

Our children have these walking-dead as role models. 

Our elders (such as we are) are impotent to counterbalance the nihilism.

We are left to being nomenclators.

The loneliness of respeaking and respelling what has appeared before us.

Nunca nuestra nación, estas almas insuficientes!

Nunca nuestra nación, estas almas insuficientes!

Never our nation, these insufficient souls.

Never our nation, these insufficient souls.

just god

 Give it

All away

Retain nothing

what to do with an acre of garlic

 Too tired to talk or think

I fall into rows of seeded

Unattention, blank, unplowed 

yo no, ya no, yo no

 I’d like to ignore racist attacks

Like those in wnba

I’d like to ignore sexist attacks

Like against former sec’y of transportation

I’d like to ignore lies, crimes and cruelties

Like those from Oval Office

What do you suggest?

Maintain a cheerful disposition?

Ask what Jesus or Buddha would do?

Donate to a political party?

As prison friends would say

“Nah, I’m good.” The polite way

of saying “go screw yourself” 

when someone suggests bulls*it

So here I am, 

Eager for you to make sense

Pretend no evil, only good

That my correct attitude would

Somehow heal the world of

These “misunderstandings” 

These cruel acts and hatreds

Not me, not me … (oh … yes, of course…!)

Not me,

Not anymore, not me

what else should I have done

Back from mountain.

Woman at prison.

Pneumonia and I stay home. 

Poem 133: The Summer Day

Who made the world? 

Who made the swan, and the black bear?

Who made the grasshopper?

This grasshopper, I mean—

the one who has flung herself out of the grass,

the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,

who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down—

who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.

Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.

Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.

I don't know exactly what a prayer is.

I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down

into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,

how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,

which is what I have been doing all day.

Tell me, what else should I have done?

Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?

Tell me, what is it you plan to do

with your one wild and precious life?

 

—Poem by Mary Oliver

I’ve never had any plans. But thank you for asking.

Mine is a meandering walk over roots and rocks up and back.

Mantras and prayers holding to walking stick.

The slow pathway to here. 

no (woman) no (cry)

 Someone asked

About hatred and

This administration 

Hatred, I said, 

Corrupts the soul

And what soul touches

(It’s a terrible time

A terrible time

Terrible time)

Terrible

(These people)

Terrible

inter alia (among other things)

Reading Sebastian Junger’s In My Time of Dying, How I came Face-to-Face With the Idea of an Afterlife. He goes with his daughter the next morning after the rain had wiped away their prior evening’s chalk drawings, thinking “We have no idea whether the universe even notices us much less cares.”

As an introvert solitary type this nescience on the part of the universe is fine with me. Ama Nesciri (love to be unknown) is as good a motto as any. One of my favorite practices for over fifteen years was to introduce myself yearly to a professor from the University of Pittsburgh when at a conference reception telling her my name. She seemed always annoyed saying “I know who you are” (then laughed) as we shook hands. I suspect it was a little game, but I never presumed anyone remembered me, did know my name or who I was.

I suspect, if such an anthropomorphism be allowed, the universe cares only for itself. Such an idea, of course, needs be modified by the proposition that “itself” includes everything in a wholistic internality of non-linearity and infinitude. We’re the ones who partialize and temporize while jockeying for preferred treatment and special acknowledgment.

We are in se and per se, in itself and by itself, as we find ourselves in this space and time we call life and the universe. It seems to take some thought and reflection to realize we are also pro alia (for another) and inter alia (among other things). Some have a difficult time grasping inter-relationality, much less a calling to be responsive and responsible for ‘others’ in the world. God help us if we are governed by such detached and non-responsive people.

Rain washes away our artwork and brief poems. 

Whole blocks of buildings collapse in an earthquake.

Civilizations disappear over long periods of time.

Inertia and entropy dance wide circles within and without our consciousness. An unchanging falling apart dizziness surrounds us as we step into and out of each particular situation befalling us.

Think nothing of it.

It is a large wave holding us under.

It is a shrugging terraform both inviting humanity and disinviting it with the nonchalance and insouciance of a self-involved entity.

For many among us, it seems to matter that we are acknowledged and cared for. That’s probably par.

For others of us, family is a sometimes thing. We are wary, worried, and full of wonder at what presents itself before us.

That we are enfolded, embraced, and cared-for is a slow awakening from a sluggish sleepiness that inches cautiously toward something dearer to us than we know. 

Rain, night, and an emptiness that (always) begins again and new, an invitation to new pastel chalk to mark creatively the ground.

hören heißt erkennen, was da ist

I know how the story goes

    so why do you want me to tell you

because I want to hear it

    

    you want me to perform it

yes, to sound it here

dirty diapers

 I’ve always wondered 

about choppers 

and their riders, 

the blasting noise, 

the revving of engine 

when on Main Street 

of small town, 

the aggressive exposure 

obnoxiously loud

i'll see you, and raise you

 if I spend eternity

looking out through

what is there

i'd be happy

if there is a ‘god’

and that ‘god’ sees fit

to allow me in heaven

that’d be ok

if I am cast into hell

for obnoxious attitude

and consigned to a cell

why not

here’s my view --

I have no idea

no idea at all

so, let’s keep dancing

historian married to maine lobsterman

 Heather Cox Richardson is as solid as a Maine lobster boat.

My recommendation— give her a listen.

https://www.youtube.com/live/KnvXXAkgMqg?si=pZEPlERAU9Nv05ql

it’s not the place, it’s the space

 I used to sit

 at the back of empty church

Where the nothing between

Where I sat

And the tabernacle

Was auspicious

I was content 

with emptiness

These days

I sit in no church 

And the nothing here

Is as sacred as sacred is

on corner stones

What is a lover but the accentuation of what is fondest, unseen yet, deepest, of that which is most intimate to us?

Deep in the valley, a beauty hides:
Serene, peerless, incomparably sweet.
In the still shade of the bamboo thicket
It seems to sigh softly for a lover.

--Ryokan (1758-1831)

Began reading Ryōkan fifty years ago. He didn’t mind. “Read me!” he’d say, “Go ahead, Read me!” 

He didn’t scare me. So, I read him. That’s what people who are unfamiliar with zen do not appreciate. A person of zen wants to be read. And they don’t care what you find. Peruse, look through, become absorbed in. Yes, read.

Ryōkan spent much of his time writing poetry, doing calligraphy, and communing with nature. His poetry is often very simple and inspired by nature. He loved children, and sometimes forgot to beg for food because he was playing with the children of the nearby village. Ryōkan refused to accept any position as a priest or even as a "poet." In the tradition of Zen his quotes and poems show he had a good sense of humour and didn't take himself too seriously.

Ryōkan's grave 

 

 

Ryōkan lived a very simple life, and stories about his kindness and generosity abound. On his deathbed, Ryōkan offered the following death poem to Teishin, his close companion:

裏を見せ 表を見せて 散る紅葉

うらをみせ おもてをみせて ちるもみじ

ura wo mise / omote wo misete / chiru momiji

Now it reveals its hidden side

and now the other—thus it falls,

an autumn leaf.^[4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ry%C5%8Dkan

As though a contemporary of Ryōkan, the poetry/songwriting sensibility of Jackson Browne addresses Ryōkan’s soft sigh: 

These Days

        (Song by Jackson Browne ‧ 1973)

Well, I've been out walking
I don't do that much talking these days
These days

These days I seem to think a lot
About the things that I forgot to do for you
And all the times I had the chance to

And I had a lover
But it's so hard to risk another, these days
These days

Now, if I seem to be afraid
To live the life that I have made in song
Well, it's just that I've been losin' for so long

Well, I'll keep on movin', movin' on
Things are bound to be improving these days
One of these days

These days I'll sit on corner stones
And count the time in quarter tones to ten, my friend
Don't confront me with my failures

I had not forgotten them 

        https://youtu.be/apkw9zKcAg0     

Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest (thank you Francis Thompson), these poets and Kinder-spielen Seelen (child-playing souls) are in our backyards and imaginative corrals dancing with whimsy and delight through the quiet morning.

You come too! (Thank you Robert.)

est nunc

 Had a dream a few minutes ago

Would have to bicycle home

Would take four hours

Only two of daylight

Boxes of stuff to transport

Damn

Who writes such a dream

Who thinks this stuff up

I fooled em, I woke up

Dog on rug by bed

Lungs squamish

Cat at window

Attack mode for what’s on 

Sun porch roof

What’s with the prayer

Formula “as it was in

The beginning, is now

And ever shall be, 

World without end”

Tell me we grasp the concept

Of time, go ahead — shee-it —

The non-linearity of spiritual

Realization

The wholeness of our ignorance

ensō standing still at midnight in yard

 Night

Holds

No secrets

Listen

Do you hear

What is being said

unknowing is the closest intimacy -- “不知”是最大的亲密

Soon passing out of sight, the evanescence of things. 

Donned in simple garb,

I commune with the blooming bush,
With feelings peculiarly my own. 

Just this day, my hairs have begun to turn white:
Last year, the flowers looked redder than these.
Their tender beauty is going the way
Of the morning dew,
Their fragrant breath is evaporating
Into the evening breeze. 

Why must we wait for their wilting
And falling before we can realize
The evanescence of life?     

--Fayen Wenyi (885–958) 

We like the oncologist.

He and the chest X-ray confirmed pneumonia.

The Walgreen pharmacist put fourteen pills in an orange snap-top thingy, and the day goes on.   

Historically, the term "the old man's friend" (or "the friend of the aged") was coined by the famous Canadian physician Sir William Osler in the late 19th century to refer to pneumonia. Before antibiotics, pneumonia was a common cause of a relatively short and painless death, which allowed the elderly to pass away quickly rather than suffering through distressing, prolonged illnesses or cognitive decay. (AI)

Can’t say much about my cognitive decay, but pill number one has gone down my throat to converse with my compromised aspirated lung about tidying up and getting on with things now that the good doctor has thrown me out into a healing regimen.

John Wu, whose book Beyond East and West I read as a novice in 1965, has written elsewhere about Fayen

Fa-yen Wen-i was a native of Yü-hang in present Chekiang, born into a Lu family. He joined a monastery early in his childhood. At first he studied under the outstanding Vinaya master Hsi-chüeh in the famous Yü-wang Temple (named after Ashoka) in present Ningpo. A lover of learning, he not only studied the Buddhist scriptures but also steeped himself in the Confucian classics. Urged by a mystic impetus stirring in him, he went southward to Fuchou (Foochow) to seek instruction from a Ch’an master there, but his mind was not opened, and hence he took to the road again. As he was passing by the monastery of Ti-tsang, he was caught in a snowstorm, so that he had to stop over for a while. As he was warming himself by the stove, the Abbot Lo-han Kuei-ch’eng asked him, “What is the destination of your present trip?” “I am only a pilgrim,” he answered. “What is the meaning of your pilgrimage?” asked the Abbot. “I don’t know,” was the reply. “Unknowing is the closest intimacy,” came the cryptic remark of the Abbot. When the snow had stopped, he took leave of the Abbot, who accompanied him to the door, and asked him, “You say that the three realms are nothing but Mind, and all dharmas nothing but Consciousness. Now tell me, is that stone out there in the courtyard within your mind or outside your mind?” “Within my mind,” he replied. At this the Abbot said, “Oh you wanderer, what makes it so necessary for you to travel with a stone on your mind?” Fa-yen was taken aback by this remark, and, laying down his bag, he decided to stay longer with the Abbot in order to settle his doubts. Every day he presented his new views and new reasons to the master; but all that the master commented was, “The Buddha Dharma is not like that.” At the end of a month, Fa-yen said to the master, “I have exhausted my stock of words and reason.” The master said, “As regards the Buddha Dharma, everything is a present reality.” At the hearing of these words Fayen was greatly enlightened. 

Later, when Fa-yen became an Abbot, he used to say to his assembly, “Reality is right before you, and yet you are apt to translate it into a world of names and forms. How are you going to re-translate it into its original?” Learned as he was, he warned his monks against mere learning. Since Reality is right before us, it can only be perceived by direct intuition, and reflection and reasoning will only blindfold our eyes. 

--from Fa-yen Wen-i: Founder of the Fa-yen House, by John C. H. Wu, Chapter XIII, in: The Golden Age of Zen, Taipei : The National War College in co-operation with The Committee on the Compilation of the Chinese Library, 1967, pp. 229-245. 

The pilgrimage is from this to that. Then, encircling the kitchen island, back to sunporch, then up stairs for nap.

It seems silly to worry about a friend’s visit. No one’s ever home. No phone answered. Just this to that back to this.

Where will Robert Thurman be reborn? Where has Thich Nhat Hanh taken his nap this afternoon? What is Kuan-Yin listening to with her sweet attention? 

Yesterday was the anniversary of my father’s death. (Cheers!)

The blooming bush outside this window is communion.

With each.

And all. 

arpeggio

 rain

heavy through night

sings

tumbling

dawn 

slipping into the woods

Ryokan is right. 

Stop the bleeding by letting it flow.

It will run through, it will run out. 

When all thoughts

Are exhausted

I slip into the woods

And gather a pile of

Shepherd’s purse.

Like the little stream

Making its way

Through mossy crevices

I, too, quietly

Turn clear and transparent.

--Ryokan (1758-1831)

What else do we have to lose?

What else must be let go

Before clarity and transparency?