New rug is in bookshed. Gertrude is in hospital. What is the relationship between the two? Both are facts. Both are part of our attention. Only one of them attends poetry circle at the nursing home. Only one of them has our prayers.

The morning sun shines in the lonely window.
I sit up straight, and my mind clears.
With a brush, I paint a landscape;
In a book, I study things from every age.
I have no desire to be a king;
My old broom is worth thousands
Of pounds of gold.
I'm happy to be in Imchun,
Reciting a poem, in solitude,
Away from the world

- Chunbong Manwoo (1357-?)

In Buddhist sitting practice at the prison we join the group for a brief while between conversations. At conversation Pat and JJ lay out the economic theories behind the current morass. They tutor us. We decide that, world-wide, there is going to have to be a new understanding of interdependence. Americans, especially, will have to come to terms with the  new conditions and cease the egoistic rage that longs to blame someone, anyone, for the inevitable change they will undergo.

Poem for the End of the Century

I am the dreamer who remains
when all the dreams are gone,
scattered by the millennial winds
and sacked by the roadside.

The solar clock hand stopped:
confusion and fury on the street
-- so much idle paper
shredded and tossed aside.

The small, dim shops of the tourist
trade are shuttered and locked ...
Nightfall, and the buyer turns away.

One more stolen fortune spent:
another century gone
with its fits and desolations --
I leave my house to the creditor wind.

Tell me if you know my name,
whose face I wear, whose stored-up
anger fades to a tentative smile.

I am the one who touches fire,
who rakes the leaves to watch them burn,
and who says once more to himself
on this calm evening of earth:

Awake! The stars are out,
mist is on the water,
and tomorrow the sun will return.

(Poem by John Haines)

The difficulty with self-help books is they presume there is a self to help. This is a major untested assumption. 

Is there something needing help? Yes.

God needs help. God is selfless. 

What to do?

Here's a possibility: Help God help us.

Don't worry about your self.

Help each revere each.

Jack and Suse, Kali and Rosie, Michael and Sue, Judith and Bill read the varied verses selected from The Course in Miracles. One of them was:

WHO ARE GOD'S TEACHERS?
A teacher of God is anyone who chooses to be one. His qualifications consist solely in this; somehow, somewhere he has made a deliberate choice in which he did not see his interests as apart from someone else's. Once he has done that, his road is established and his direction is sure. A light has entered the darkness. It may be a single light, but that is enough. He has entered an agreement with God even if he does not yet believe in Him. He has become a bringer of salvation. He has become a teacher of God.
(http://courseinmiracles.com/teachers_manual/who_are_gods_teachers1.htm)

There is concern about the swelling of right-wing groups. Guns, explosives, fiery rhetoric, and over-the-top name calling grow themselves in rallies, cable stations, and celebrity pay-fests. I worry the game some politicians play with the emotions of large crowds grows dangerous.

My zen hut leans at the summit

Clouds sail back and forth

A waterfall hangs in front

A mountain ridge crests in back

On a rock wall I sketched three buddhas

For incense there's a plum branch in a jar

The fields below might be level

But can't match a mountain home free of dust

- Stonehouse

Who teaches what God is teaches God to be as God should be.

I'm skeptical.

God is God. Not an old man, not a right wing or left wing savior, and not something out there judging and damning and rewarding.

God is, only, and merely, God. That's all God is.

That is: All -- God Is.

A deliberate choice not to see your interests as apart from someone else's.

The frozen pizza cooking in oven sends fragrance this way. Woman and dog wend their way home from away.

Today, in the confusion of new moon mind, I teach God the gratitude of the onliness and mereness of God.

Choose to be one.

There's no antidote to being human. We've got to go through it. All the difference of opinion. All the striving for fame and power, money and more money.

One news item said the Sarah Palin has taken in 15 million dollars since resigning as governer of Alaska. Smart move.

Here, just picking up remnants of cedar shingles and packing them into tubs for kindling. Being human is an uncertain adventure.

Zen meditation should be done in good faith.

Study hard, driving yourself farther.

When your doubt is ground into powder,

Mud cows will plough the field of pre-creation.

- Naong Haegun (1320-1376)

Progresso chicken soup in wooden bowl, garlic bread, and water from glass jar. I watch film on computer. Today is enough for today.

Mockingbirds

This morning

two mockingbirds

in the green field

were spinning and tossing

the white ribbons

of their songs

into the air.

I had nothing

better to do

than listen.

I mean this

seriously.

In Greece,

a long time ago,

an old couple

opened their door

to two strangers

who were,

it soon appeared,

not men at all,

but gods.

It is my favorite story--

how the old couple

had almost nothing to give

but their willingness

to be attentive--

but for this alone

the gods loved them

and blessed them--

when they rose

out of their mortal bodies,

like a million particles of water

from a fountain,

the light

swept into all the corners

of the cottage,

and the old couple,

shaken with understanding,

bowed down--

but still they asked for nothing

but the difficult life

which they had already.

And the gods smiled, as they vanished,

clapping their great wings.

Wherever it was

I was supposed to be

this morning--

whatever it was I said

I would be doing--

I was standing

at the edge of the field--

I was hurrying

through my own soul,

opening its dark doors--

I was leaning out;

I was listening

(Poem by Mary Oliver)

Keep watch.

I'm not very smart.

Still, I try to make my way through.

If Islamic Law male fundamentalists would give up stoning women to death, and Roman Catholic clergy pedophiles and their paternal protectors would cease their behavior, then God might emerge from the back alley where he cries with sorrowful shame at such cruel and obscene actions.

But to personify God in this anthropomorphic way is itself a disservice. There is no such personified God.

'God' is the way life longs for compassion and love.

Shadow behavior is the failure of human beings to be Godly. Projecting rather than protecting, judging rather than recognizing, controlling rather than surrendering.

The entire place is brightly
Illuminated and spiritually
Transformed,
Totally unobstructed
And clearly manifesting
Responsive interaction
Like box and lid or arrowpoints meeting.
- Hongzhi Zhengjue (1091–1157)

We've misunderstood 'fitness.' We think it means exercise and proper diet. Rather, fitness is the arrows lining up, doing the right thing, not forcing misalignment into expedient attack. What's wrong will still sound wrong no matter how smoothly it is spun and spun.

There's talk these days about being an unaffiliated Buddhist or an unaffiliated Christian. There is less confidence among practitioners of contemporary spirituality for aligning with fixed systems or subscribed belief.

Miscreant systems, structures, and sycophants have committed patricide in the name of worshipful sacrifice.

We are nobody's son.

Unaffiliated.

One of the most beloved of all Japanese divinities, Jizo works to ease the suffering and shorten the sentence of those serving time in hell, to deliver the faithful into Amida's western paradise (where inhabitants are no longer trapped in the six states of desire and karmic rebirth), and to answer the prayers of the living for health, success, children, and all manner of petitions. In modern Japan, Jizo is a savior par excellence, a friend to all, never frightening even to children, and his/her many manifestations -- often cute and cartoon-like in contemporary times -- incorporate Taoist, Buddhist, and Shinto elements.

Jizō is a Bodhisattva (Jp. Bosatsu), one who achieves enlightenment but postpones Buddhahood until all can be saved. Jizo is often translated as Womb of the Earth, for JI means earth, while ZO means womb. But ZO can also be translated with equal correctness as “store house” or “repository of treasure” -- thus Jizo is often translated as Earth Store or Earth Treasury. Jizo embodies supreme spiritual optimism, compassion, and universal salvation, all hallmarks of Mahayana Buddhism.

)http://www.onmarkproductions.com/html/jizo1.shtml)

Merely orphaned.

Paternally bereft.

Earth-womb prayerful.

Bob suggested it be called "BLB." Those were the letters of the first names of the three people sipping tea and eating peanut butter cookies talking about the dissolution of the Roman Catholic Church, the heartlessness of capitalism, and the need for more cookies.

Between bites we decided to found something between the Roman Catholic Church and the Protestant Churches. It would be Catholic without the traditional Roman, male, hierarchical structure. And it would be Protestant without the multitudinous denominational varieties.

Catholics who'd fallen away could fall back into the ready elemental symbols of water, fire, breath, earth, seeing, and hearing - all with aesthetic luminosity. Protestants weary of whatever Protestants are weary of can choose personal invigoration without being against anything or defining oneself as not being something else.

At the center of this church is the wholeness of what is here.

At the center of this church is the wholeness of what is here.

At the center of this church is the wholeness of what is here.

(Are you concerned that no name has been mentioned? Perhaps No-Name need be for what or who or how what is here is what is here. What do you usually call it? Do you call it Christ? Do you call it Jesus? Do you call it Buddha? Do you call it Ha Shem? Do you call it Ram? Do you call it El Shaddai? Do you call it Allah? Do you call it Kami? Do you call it Tao? Do you call it Brahman? Vishnu? Shiva? Do you call it No-God? Do you call it Shunyata? Do you call it Gaia? Do you call it Cosmos, Theos, Anthropos? Do you shudder in silence and awe at the immense unknowability of the centric reality of everything that lives and breathes and has its being?)

In this church you can call it what you will. When you call it, when you speak it -- please do it with service and reverence for each name and each person calling each name.

Maybe we'll call it The Church of Integral Cosmotheandric Ecospirituality. If that's too inconvenient, something one-worded, like Ciao, or Servus. Maybe, Meetingbrook. (The last suggested title is wonderfully unknown but self-explanatory.)

Like God, this church would have no edges, only unlimited centers. The structure would be null. There would be no rules or dogmas, only cups for tea, coffee, or fresh water. Dancing and laughter and solitary walks with respected friends (like dogs or people) would be liturgy, horarium, and sacrament. Conversation, the circle of listening and speaking, gazing and being present, would be eucharistic.

(I, it goes without saying, will have nothing to do with this church. My hermit-nature would smile with tears in eyes from a short distance out of sight seeing the sweet inclusive kindness of the gathering. I probably wouldn't want to belong to it, nor would anyone else want to have me as a member.)

But here's the bottom line: time has come to find One's Self.

And to find One's Self where it is found -- within oneself and, correspondingly, between you and every other being. This quiet revelation will be the core contemplation of the so-called church. It would be a nice coincidence.

The Roman Catholic Church, the Evangelical Churches, The Mainline Protestant, and the Many Denominations have exhausted themselves trying to define their differences while attempting, reluctantly, to cite unity with their different counterparts.

Name it this: This New Integral Cosmotheandric Ecosystem -- Community of Interdependent Nature Collating Insight, Devotion, Enlightenment, Numinosity, Compassion & Enthusiasm. (NICE -- COINCIDENCE)

We proclaim this NICE -- COINCIDENCE to hereby emerge, exist, and include everyone.

	"How did we get here?" "How long is the road?" However it ends, it begins with us, this feast by which we come to see how beautiful we are.
	from poem "Mysteries of The Incarnation" by Kathleen Norris, in Little Girls in Church

Bring only your attention and being present. You are this place. You are that place. Call it Here. This is a good name for a church. (Help each revere each: Here).

(Send no money to this new place. Save your money. Maybe give a few dollars to someone who can immediately put the money to good use.)

And pray without ceasing -- saying: I am what is looking for what is looking for all of us.

Be happy. Love everyone. Try not to be a jerk.

Thomas Merton (1915-1968) © 1985 Br. Robert Lentz, OFM

For inspiration we'll invite Thomas Merton to mentor us.

Whatever your vision, show it here.

Whatever your belief, share it here.

Whatever your prayer, be it here.

Two of us at morning practice. Later, three cars pull in dooryard. A forth even later with two folks who will be married visiting to discuss the order of the ceremony.

They will say 'yes' to relatedness.

What the dharma brings us, what it teaches us, very essentially, is to be pure, authentic, and natural. The first and most important thing is pure motivation. There’s a famous story about a hermit long ago in Tibet called Geshe Ben. He was in retreat, and one day he heard that his sponsors, who were financing his retreat, were coming to visit him. So he cleaned his room, arranged the shrine very neatly, set out all the offerings perfectly, and then sat and waited for his sponsors to arrive. Suddenly, just before they arrived, he reflected on his motivation and said to himself, “What am I doing? This is all fake. I’m just hoping to create a good impression, that’s all!” He snatched a handful of ash from the stove by his side and flung it all over the shrine and the offerings. A great master called Padampa Sangye who heard about this called it “the greatest offering in the whole of Tibet.”
-Sogyal Rinpoche

My practice is to allow what is moving through to move through.

Some day I'll pick up the mess in my room.

Even if not, there's no order of benefit in pretending to be what we are.

God does not will things to happen; but what happens is the longing of God for compassionate response.

Peter brought in David Hawkins' Power vs Force and said some things about kinesiology. Joseph brought in the book he was reading, The First Circle, by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. Patrick talked about the Abnormal Psychology course he was taking and the notions of deviance, distress, dysfunction, and danger. Joe spoke about ekpyrosis (but he inferred palingenisis). Ryan referenced Therese Huston's Teaching What You Don't Know and felt that perseverance was the hallmark of a good teacher, not necessarily insight or dazzling skill.

It was a good morning in prison. The conversation was afire with chapter 29 of the Tao Te Ching, the noble and eightfold teachings of the Buddha, and, finally, Merwin's poem, "Thanks." We managed to laugh and learn by respectful deliberation.

Believe nothing because a wise man said it.
Believe nothing because it is generally held.
Believe nothing because it is written.
Believe nothing because it is said to be divine
Believe nothing because someone else believes it.
But believe only what you yourself judge to be true.
- The Buddha

We're surrounded by our source and we surround our origin.

We read Dale's aunt's poem "I Remember" about the horse sled with bells taking uncle away for winter then bringing him back from logging camp for spring. Ricky joined us between sit-ups and running the treadmill.

Prison was a kindly place today.

There is no match for the longing of minds to see through their lives.

No bugs yet. Morning walks along trails on Ragged Mountain with Rokpa are kindly and tiring. Trees listen. Mud constricts with sodden leaves.

In seven and a half hours hiking over the last four days I have met no one and passed no one. Where have I been?

Who isn't happy when it rains during drought?
Everyone washes off the dirt.
Every leaf of grass opens its eyes and dances,
Every flower drinks and is refreshed.
Farmers in raincoats are busy in the fields,
Herb-gatherers have no time to rest.
Watching this natural course of events,
I marvel at the innocence of the universe.
- Naong Haegun (1320-1376)

I have gone missing.

The innocence of the universe -- its not knowing -- seems truer each time I look. There is only walking. There is only dog running. There is only mountain.

In class last night someone asked why I watch things like the 2007 strafing killing in New Baghdad if such sights are so upsetting.

No reason. Only feeling.

Not to allow this horror to be seen is to pretend the world is a disjointed and fragmentary compilation of dissociated and unrelated shards of something broken that we cannot remember whole.

Much like our individual lives in this world.

We don't like suffering. Why should we? This is not about choosing suffering over non-suffering. This witnessing is about choosing not to live in an illusory egoic world where what happens does not happen and what does not happen does. I part company (for now) with those who insist that if you don't think about it, it does not exist -- not in itself and not in you.

THANKS

by W.S Merwin

Listen
with the night falling we are saying thank you
we are stopping on the bridges to bow for the railings
we are running out of the glass rooms
with our mouths full of food to look at the sky
and say thank you
we are standing by the water looking out
in different directions.

back from a series of hospitals back from a mugging
after funerals we are saying thank you
after the news of the dead
whether or not we knew them we are saying thank you
looking up from tables we are saying thank you
in a culture up to its chin in shame
living in the stench it has chosen we are saying thank you
over telephones we are saying thank you
in doorways and in the backs of cars and in elevators
remembering wars and the police at the back door
and the beatings on stairs we are saying thank you
in the banks that use us we are saying thank you
with the crooks in office with the rich and fashionable
unchanged we go on saying thank you thank you

with the animals dying around us
our lost feelings we are saying thank you
with the forests falling faster than the minutes
of our lives we are saying thank you
with the words going out like cells of a brain
with the cities growing over us like the earth
we are saying thank you faster and faster
with nobody listening we are saying thank you
we are saying thank you and waving

dark though it is

The world is given. As attractive as it might be to ponder, I have not made the world. As terrifying as it might be to consider, you alone can retrieve the word that restates the world.

It's not that the world is what you say it is. Rather, the world is re-created with the word or words coming forth into it from and through you.

It's why we pray. Prayer is not "spin" trying to refashion a story so as to get the best interpretation from it. Prayer is the origin of reality reaching through silence and words to reveal its true nature to the seeker longing to see what is truly the core of this existence.

We pray to be the origin of the world -- not to correct the wrongs, but to be what is right as it passes through us from the invisible to the visible.

The life of prayer is listening for the intonation of the soundless. The life of prayer is looking for the materialization of the mere-breath. The life of prayer is stopping -- it is the radical cessation of all attempts to construct an alternative to what is disturbing, and an allowing of stillness to shape the contours and parameters of compassionate being with oneself and others.

Like railroad track crossings at countryside roads the imperative to stop, look, and listen suggests that something might be coming, that it's been there, and the rails are both remnant and promise. Ours is to act on the evidence. Ours, to cross over to the other side.

What is on the other side?

What is on this side?

What is anything I do?

Perhaps it is what is longing to be authentically encountered, engaged, and energized with what is itself Encounter, Engagement, and Energy.

Once, we called this 'God.'

Now?

We call it to and through itself to be what it is within and through us. And the world. And each person, place, living-thing, and being-presence.

Each tree teaches me this. Each stone teaches me this. Each parasite and virus. Each animal. Each person. Each and every manifestation of the One-we-call-God teaches me this.

We know this.

If we become what we know...

If we actually were to be what we are...

If we find the origin of the world and dwell as this origin...

Long walks on mountain.

White Border Collie with black spots runs alongside and ahead.

Deep solitude. Expanded silence. A gliding stillness.

Illusory Hermitage

My body is like an illusory flower:
No way to touch it;
The window and the moon of its six windows
Contain clear emptiness.
It looks like something
In the midst of nothingness,
But its four walls are beautiful,
I stay there for a moment.
- Naong Haegun (1320-1376)

Piece by piece the illusory life crumbles.

Hard to say what reality will endure.

Only the mountain.

Only the mountain walking.

Only the mountain walking feels like prayer.

Making zazen before Pascal candle and Tibetan incense a quiet mediation meditation.

Watching video from 2007 during Iraq war, 30mm cannon fire killing between 12 and 18 people, is not the Easter Monday activity I would prefer to write about. The 17 minutes sicken.

5th April 2010 10:44 EST WikiLeaks has released a classified US military video depicting the indiscriminate slaying of over a dozen people in the Iraqi suburb of New Baghdad -- including two Reuters news staff.

Reuters has been trying to obtain the video through the Freedom of Information Act, without success since the time of the attack. The video, shot from an Apache helicopter gun-site, clearly shows the unprovoked slaying of a wounded Reuters employee and his rescuers. Two young children involved in the rescue were also seriously wounded.
(Collateral Murder. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/05/wikileaks-exposes-video-o_n_525569.html)

I would rather write about light and hope and emancipation and unity and consciousness of what is beyond the veil of ignorance.

The nature of the one Reality must be known by one's own clear spiritual perception; it cannot be known through a learned person. Similarly, the form of the moon can only be known through one's own eyes. How can it be known through others?
- Shankara

But war with its ugliness was inserted into the mix. I stopped to look. I saw the arrogance of fear and exuberance for destruction firing death and suffering into the bodies of men and children.

Christ rises. Citizens are murdered. Cruelty is what war is.

Through the bottomless mercy of our God,
one born on high will visit us
to give light to those who walk in darkness,
who live in the shadow of death;
to lead our feet in the path of peace.
(--from Benedictus, morning prayer)

Don't watch the video.

If you do, you'll be changed.

Don't think about Resurrection.

If you do, you'll change the world.

Christ is Risen!

Ego doesn't stand a chance.

Easter morning, Meetingbrook Hermitage:

"Come, all you who are thirsty,

come to the waters;

and you who have no money,

come, buy and eat!

Come, buy wine and milk

without money and without cost.

Why spend money on what is not bread,

and your labor on what does not satisfy?

Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good,

and your soul will delight in the richest of fare.

(from Isaiah 55)

As the rain and the snow

come down from heaven,

and do not return to it

without watering the earth

and making it bud and flourish,

so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,

so is my word that goes out from my mouth:

It will not return to me empty,

but will accomplish what I desire

and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.

(from Isaiah 55)

That the yielding
Conquers the resistant
And the soft
Conquers the hard
Is a fact known by all people,
Yet utilized by none.

-Lao tzu

You will go out in joy

and be led forth in peace;

the mountains and hills

will burst into song before you,

and all the trees of the field

will clap their hands.

(from Isaiah 55)

We begin in the dark.

Slowly, comes dawn.

Awaking birds.

Awakening earth.

Finally, sunrise.

Now, Resurrection!

We wish all the joy and liberation of a new beginning!

"...[B]ut see, I who am life itself am now one with you."

Reading From an ancient homily for Holy Saturday
(The Lord's descent into the underworld)

Something strange is happening – there is a great silence on earth today, a great silence and stillness. The whole earth keeps silence because the King is asleep. The earth trembled and is still because God has fallen asleep in the flesh and he has raised up all who have slept ever since the world began. God has died in the flesh and hell trembles with fear.
He has gone to search for our first parent, as for a lost sheep. Greatly desiring to visit those who live in darkness and in the shadow of death, he has gone to free from sorrow the captives Adam and Eve, he who is both God and the son of Eve. The Lord approached them bearing the cross, the weapon that had won him the victory. At the sight of him Adam, the first man he had created, struck his breast in terror and cried out to everyone: “My Lord be with you all.” Christ answered him: “And with your spirit.” He took him by the hand and raised him up, saying: “Awake, O sleeper, and rise from the dead, and Christ will give you light.”
I am your God, who for your sake have become your son. Out of love for you and for your descendants I now by my own authority command all who are held in bondage to come forth, all who are in darkness to be enlightened, all who are sleeping to arise. I order you, O sleeper, to awake. I did not create you to be held a prisoner in hell. Rise from the dead, for I am the life of the dead. Rise up, work of my hands, you who were created in my image. Rise, let us leave this place, for you are in me and I am in you; together we form only one person and we cannot be separated. For your sake I, your God, became your son; I, the Lord, took the form of a slave; I, whose home is above the heavens, descended to the earth and beneath the earth. For your sake, for the sake of man, I became like a man without help, free among the dead. For the sake of you, who left a garden, I was betrayed to the Jews in a garden, and I was crucified in a garden.
See on my face the spittle I received in order to restore to you the life I once breathed into you. See there the marks of the blows I received in order to refashion your warped nature in my image. On my back see the marks of the scourging I endured to remove the burden of sin that weighs upon your back. See my hands, nailed firmly to a tree, for you who once wickedly stretched out your hand to a tree.
I slept on the cross and a sword pierced my side for you who slept in paradise and brought forth Eve from your side. My side has healed the pain in yours. My sleep will rouse you from your sleep in hell. The sword that pierced me has sheathed the sword that was turned against you.
Rise, let us leave this place. The enemy led you out of the earthly paradise. I will not restore you to that paradise, but I will enthrone you in heaven. I forbade you the tree that was only a symbol of life, but see, I who am life itself am now one with you. I appointed cherubim to guard you as slaves are guarded, but now I make them worship you as God. The throne formed by cherubim awaits you, its bearers swift and eager. The bridal chamber is adorned, the banquet is ready, the eternal dwelling places are prepared, the treasure houses of all good things lie open. The kingdom of heaven has been prepared for you from all eternity.
(--from Office of Readings, Holy Saturday)

Let's enter completely this place. Then, let's leave this place. For where? I can't say...not today. Today is emptiness itself. The silence and stillness bid me mute.

The resurrection is the complete triumph of Christ over the ego, not by attack but by transcendence. For Christ does rise above the ego and all its works, and ascends to the Father and His Kingdom.
Would you join in the resurrection or the crucifixion? Would you condemn your brothers or free them? Would you transcend your prison and ascend to the Father?
(--fromA Course in Miracles/Text/Chapter 11,Section VII, Waking to Redemption, http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/A_Course_in_Miracles/Text/Chapter_11)

But see.

I who am.

Life itself.

Am now.

One.

With.

You.

Emptiness...

Is it me?

Yes it is.

Still, taste.

And see.

Reasonable dialogue.

The Tao is as deep as can be. Who is willing to pursue it closely? If you don't go into the tiger's lair, how can you catch its cub? If you don't wash out the stone and sand, how can you pick out the gold? Carefully seek the heart of heaven and earth with firm determination. Suddenly you will see the original thing; everywhere you meet the source, all is a forest of jewels.
- Liu I-Ming

Don't look left. Don't look right.

Look through the unnecessary divisions and distractions.

Look carefully.

There.

You are.

HaShem is the Name.

We pause at bridge over brook and sing: "Blessed be the Name of the Lord from this day hence and forever. From the rising of the sun to its setting the Name of the Lord is to be praised."

The Name, says Saskia last week, is all this.

Meditation is not about getting away from it all, numbing out, or stopping thoughts. Without trying to be rid of pesky thoughts and feelings, we learn how to practice being aware of them in the fleeting immediacy of the very moment in which they present themselves. We can cultivate awareness of any object: sounds, smells, physical sensations, perceptions, and so forth. Everything is grist for the mill - even those things we find terribly unpleasant. As the Tibetan Dragon Master Gyalwang Drukpa says, “Everything must be meditated!”
- Lama Surya Das, "The Heart of Buddhist Meditation," (Tricycle, Winter 2007)

With spade in hand I contour rivulets and torrents coming down mountain into agreeable flows to lower places free from obstruction of leaves and silt and away from places where harm could be done.

Maine's rivers are flooding tonight.

Like a mind swelling with resentment over the success of another, we fabricate grievances. In politics the Republicans grieve health reform even though many of their ideas were incorporated in it. Theirs is a political choice: defeat their political private enemy; let the people be enslaved during the pique of partisan battle.

Give up grievances. It is exhausting finding fault in everything. Find something more inchoate.

Never in this world does hatred
Cease by hatred;
Hatred ceases by love,
And this according to a law
Which has existed forever.
- Buddha

The time of Passover reminds that in the worst of slavery there is a way through and out. However impossible things seem, we are shown the way though, we are surprised by finding out.

For the righteous, the little they have is better
than the abundant wealth of the wicked.
The limbs of the wicked will be broken
while the Lord gives his strength to the just.

The Lord knows when the day of the perfect will come;
and their inheritance will be eternal.
They will not be troubled in evil times,
and in times of famine they will have more than enough.
(from Psalm 36)

What is your name?

Blessed be that.

We have enough.

We are enough.

L'Chaim!

To Life!

Rainy Week. Contemporary alternative to Holy Week. Maine is getting soaked.

It is the hermitage this season. The alternative doesn't present itself this year. We'll stay at the mountain, so to speak, on our own.

Therefore, be as a lamp
Unto yourselves,
Be as a refuge to yourselves.
Take no external refuge.
Hold fast to the Truth as a lamp;
Hold fast to the Truth as a refuge.
Look not for a refuge in anyone besides yourselves.
- The Buddha

The Catholic Church is on the ropes. An aging pug with little spring left in legs it is pounded by its own inability to practice what it preaches. Molesters and cover ups have taken the church out drinking and carousing the night before the fight and lied about its whereabouts in the morning.

A beat reporter has her take on the sorry condition of the heavyweight:

If the church could throw open its stained glass windows and let in some air, invite women to be priests, nuns to be more emancipated and priests to marry, if it could banish criminal priests and end the sordid culture of men protecting men who attack children, it might survive. It could be an encouraging sign of humility and repentance, a surrender of arrogance, both moving and meaningful.
...American bishops have gotten politically militant in recent years, opposing the health care bill because its language on abortion wasn’t vehement enough, and punishing Catholic politicians who favor abortion rights and stem cell research. They should spend as much time guarding the kids already under their care as they do championing the rights of those who aren’t yet born.
(--from OP-ED, A Nope for Pope, By MAUREEN DOWD, Published: March 27, 2010, NY Times)

The people once in pews are moving out into the countryside. The symbols and rituals survive the transition but transfigure and transform into more ordinary expressions of humanity, cosmos, and divinity all rolled into one.

Even in the traditional narrative there was a new appearance of the man disfigured in the power lust thrown against him by both religious and political addicts. He was not recognized in his new manifestation transcending their obscenely perverse and pettifogging pretenses to patronize the populace.

We're meant to come through differently. The story of this week is our transmogrification.

It happens of itself.

When we allow.

Itself.

To be.

Each.

One.

Of us.

Today we do nothing out of the ordinary.

Yo Hermitage



Within its boundaries - no people, no birds. 


Falling petals gather on the moss.


An old monk has nothing to do


But gaze at the moon in the pine tree


And smile at the passing clouds. 




- Taego Bowoo (1301-1382)

In chapel-zendo, as wood stove warmth dissolves, a solitary candle holds silence following practice.

Everyone is welcome here.