It is. It is time to wake. It is time to wake from ignorance, illusion, and sleep.

Why?

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good,
for his love is for ever.
Give thanks to the God of gods,
for his love is for ever.
Give thanks to the Lord of lords,
for his love is for ever.
--Psalm 135 (136)

It turns to Advent. For too long we have been away from ourselves.

Now, we are being called home.

Being.

Called.

Home.

Here is wide open. Wherever 'there' might be, 'here' is wide and limitless open.

My thatched hut the whole sky
Is its roof
The mountains are its hedge
And it has the sea for a garden
I’m inside with nothing at all
Not even a bag
And yet there are visitors who say
“It’s hidden behind a bamboo door”
- Muso Soseki (1275-1351)

Here is beyond understanding. How can there be 'here' and still be there?

As he was walking by the Sea of Galilee, Jesus saw two brothers, Simon, who was called Peter, and his brother Andrew; they were making a cast in the lake with their net, for they were fishermen.
(-Matthew 4: 18)

The feast of Andrew is an iconic beginning to Advent Season. It all begins again. Will there be a birth to bring here what we've always considered there?

Christmas Anticipation Prayer
Beginning on St. Andrew the Apostle's feast day, November 30, the following beautiful prayer is traditionally recited fifteen times a day until Christmas. This is a very meditative prayer that helps us increase our awareness of the real focus of Christmas and helps us prepare ourselves spiritually for His coming.

Hail and blessed be the hour and moment In which the Son of God was born Of the most pure Virgin Mary, at midnight, in Bethlehem, in the piercing cold. In that hour vouchsafe, I beseech Thee, O my God, to hear my prayer and grant my desires, [here mention your request] through the merits of Our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of His blessed Mother. Amen
http://www.catholicculture.org/liturgicalyear/prayers/view.cfm?id=951

The prayer asks 'here' to mention its request. What will 'here' ask for? Something vital you might suppose. Something which no one could do without.

'Here' asks, I suspect, for itself.

Itself -- where hour and moment complete what is blessed.

There is no bamboo door.

Just sky, mountain, and sea.

Dwell out of the bag.

Cat comes in from barn. Chilled night.

The wise people of old who
Took goodness as their way
Were retiring as though shy

Their conduct to all was
Respectful as though to
Honored guests;
They could adapt themselves
Like ice melting before a fire;
They were artless
As blocks of uncarved wood.
- Lao tzu

We're not meant to be dependent on one another. Something is meant to exist between us. To that place we venture, stepping out of ego and self-containment.

The middle place is not me, not you.

A new being is there.

We must consider.

What we have.

Made.

Each yawn wider.

suppose

Life is an old man carrying flowers on his head.

young death sits in a cafe
smiling, a pierce of money held between
his thumb and first finger

(i say "will he buy flowers" to you
and "Death is young
life wears velour trousers
life totters, life has a beard" i

say to you who are silent.--"Do you see
Life? he is there and here,
or that, or this
or nothing or an old man 3 thirds
asleep, on his head
flowers, always crying
to nobody something about les
roses les bluets
yes,
will He buy?
Les belles bottes--oh hear
, pas cheres")

and my love slowly answered I think so. But
I think I see someone else

there is a lady, whose name is Afterwards
she is sitting beside young death, is slender;
likes flowers.
(Poem, suppose, by e.e. cummings)

No more.

Sleep.

Today, yes, today.

# One Single Day
110. Better than a hundred years lived in vice, without contemplation, is a one single day of life lived in virtue and in deep concentration.
111. Better than a hundred years lived in ignorance, without contemplation, is one single day of life lived in wisdom and deep concentration.
112. Better than a hundred years lived in idleness and in weakness is a day of life lived with courage and powerful striving.
113. Better than a hundred years not considering how all things arise and pass away is is one single day of life if one considers how all things arise and pass away.
114. Better than a hundred years not seeing one's own immortality is one single day if one sees one's own immortality.
115. Better than a hundred years of not seeing the Path supreme is one single day of life if one sees the Path supreme.
(- The Dhammapada, trans. by Juan Mascaro from Everyday Mind, a Tricycle book edited by Jean Smith)

Reading Immanuel Kant: Not inclination; good will.

Bailing skiff after Tuesday Evening Conversation -- Pema on Shantideva.

Watching helicopter in Bangor Airport from Public Works yard in afternoon, walking by piles of stones, culverts, and earthen mounds.

Just once. For everything. It's just once.

The illusion is habitual repetition.

It happens just once.

Nothing twice.

Each time, once.

We never know about prayer.

It opens into the open itself. Prayer goes into the open. There's no telling to whom or where it goes. Thich Nhat Hanh says we pray to the living as well as the deceased.

Awake or asleep
In a grass hut,
What I pray for is
To bring others across
Before myself.
- Dogen (1200-1253)

Bodhisattvas, at times, don't know they are bodhisattvas. What they do know is the gaze of compassion, the steadiness of listening, and the longing to assist the other into a happy, safe, dwelling in peace.

I'd like to live a life of prayer.

Grateful for any response. Or none.

Longing for well-being, yours and mine.

Ours.

High tide was high. Low, low. Town was empty. Moon full,

When we drop our boundaries we not only see neighbor as self, we let what is there be seen, without fear.

Here I have enough to eat
And I have taken root far
From the world
People who like to find fault
Can melt even gold with their talk
Why should I listen to that
My mind is weightless and
Without color like the lingering fog
The sound of the evening waves
Wakes me from my afternoon nap
Cradled in the breast of this mountain
I have forgotten its original wildness
Day after day watching the sea
I have never seen its depths
If I cannot attain the very heart of Zen
A wave a thousand miles long
Will rise up and heave on the
Sea beyond my gate.
- Muso Soseki (1275-1351)

There really is no place to go -- not here, not hereafter.

By letting go of geography and wristwatch -- dropping space and time -- we understand the priest's words: this is my body, this my blood -- and we look around to see ourselves resplendent in the forms of each and every thing and being nearby.

I don't know if you recognize me. I'm no one. Just passing through.

Going nowhere.

In particular.

Loving the ride.