Joan had a failure of imagination.

Life is full of small and larger sorrows. No escaping them. No explaining them away. We grieve until next the grief extinguishes itself.

It's nice to see good drama, laced with humor and theology, on television.

What if God was one of us
Just a slob like one of us
Just a stranger on the bus
Trying to make His way home
("One of Us," opening song for TV show Joan of Arcadia; Lyrics by Joan Osborne)

War is a larger sorrow.

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Nov. 15 — Two American Black Hawk helicopters collided in midair and crashed Saturday evening in the northern city of Mosul, killing at least 12 of the American soldiers aboard and wounding nine others, officials said.
NYT, 15Nov03)

In class the other night two students mocked the fact and the person of former Vice President Al Gore who'd delivered a speech on "Wrong Targets" at Constitution Hall, Washington, D.C., November 9, 2003. Not a word about the substance of Gore's comments.

Elsewhere, in response to comments by Gore Vidal about the current administration in Washington published on Thursday, November 13, 2003 by The LA Weekly, a fellow writes me excoriating the man, his sexual and political stance, adding, "To give him forum is despicable and to listen to a "progressive" view is pure foolishness. Come on!!!" Not a word about the content of Vidal's comments.

Sorrows mount.

20 in Turkey Killed by 2 Truck Bombs Outside Synagogues:
Two truck bombs exploded today outside a pair of synagogues crowded with families celebrating bar mitzvahs, killing at least 20 people and injuring more than 300.(New York Times Online, 15Nov03)

If God was one of us, God died 32 times in Iraq and Turkey today. The United States government does not dignify deaths of Iraqi's by even mentioning or approximating the numbers killed in their country by Americans. News organizations have no numbers to add.

Who attends God's funeral?

Rebuilding Bodies, and Lives, Maimed by War
As more soldiers survive attacks that would have killed them a generation ago, more inevitably return from Iraq with grievous injuries.(NYT on the Web, 15Nov03)

We suffer failures of imagination.

(Tommy and Lloyd talk about grandparents and wars they've seen as fire burns to ash at end of day. Norm and Sky have walked back up Bayview to their house after talking of philosopher Paul Weiss, String Theory, and the necessity of conversing the various disciplines as spirituality finds new expressions of itself. Charlotte's sketches of Tibetan monks hang with silence from beam they arrived at this morning after conversation with The Grace in Dying.)

When imagination is blessed with light, we rejoice.

Veterans are old ones.

Everyone who has been in a war as a combatant is, I submit, an old one.

What they have seen, what they had to do, makes one old.

Subhuti, does it occur to you that I believe that through me living beings are led to liberation? Never think that way, Subhuti. Why? Because there is no separate being to lead to liberation. If I were to think there was, I would be caught in the notion of a self or person or a life span. Subhuti, what I call a self is essentially not a self in the way that an ordinary person thinks of it. But neither do I think of anyone as an ordinary person. However, knowing the essence, I can use the name, ordinary person
- Diamond Sutra

Day by day new men and women grow old surrounded by war. They go to war under orders from commander. They go to serve and protect. They grow in courage through fear and duress. We ask them to go through their lives prematurely old.

'Vetus,' in Latin, means old. We must be grateful to our old ones. They have fought and sacrificed for us.

Psalm 137 (138)
Thanksgiving
I will praise you, Lord, with all my heart, for you have heard the words of my mouth.
In the presence of the angels I will make music to you, worship before your holy temple.
I will praise your name because of your mercy and faithfulness: high above all other names is the greatness of your word.

Each day that I call on you, Lord, listen to me, strengthen my spirit.
All the kings of the earth will proclaim your glory, Lord, when they hear your word.
They will sing of the paths of the Lord, so great is his glory.
For the Lord is on high but he cares for the humble; and he knows the proud from afar.

If I walk in the midst of troubles, you will give me life. If my enemies rise up against me, your right hand will keep me safe.
The Lord does all that I need. Lord, your kindness lasts for ever: do not forsake the work of your hands.

It is now time for kindness.

Let us now become no longer old.

Let those who are veterans and those becoming veterans enter into the safe and liberating embrace of life without war.

Kindness with gratitude.

At prison conversation Ryan asked, "When do you live your truth, and when do you live their story?"

Know the functions of the mind.
Its functions produce
The treasury of teachings.
When its activity
Is always silent,
Myriad illusions become suchness.
- Tao-hsin (580-651)

In the text Ryan brought, the words, " The Ontong Javanese name according to everyday behavior and experience, not according to formal definition." And, "Names describe emotive experience, not observed forms or functions."(p.131, in Codification of Reality: Lineal and Non-lineal , by Dorothy Lee, 1959.)

Charlie was quiet. Bob spoke up. Joe was energetic. Saskia and Nancy spoke of truth and lies, and how story and truth both require attention.

Ryan said, "You don't have to look for what's not missing."

We were all there. Even those missing from Friday's table were there -- whether in traces or spirit, where traces of oneself reside. Everyone mind alerted was there.

Ryan said it at end, "That which holds all things together is the common language we are trying to learn."

Walking out of education/activities building after goodbyes, I put hand in packet and feel the 'person-down' alarm there. I'm stunned to say, "I forgot to turn this in." Polly and companions look at me with curiosity. I realize my mistake -- I'm still inside -- we haven't gone through the main wing to command central.

Such it was.

Such it is.

Still there.

In truth.

Moonlight slants cold through mountain trees.

Cabin woodstove shares warmth with candlelight.

Silence throughout as feeders swing in dark; birdseed’s first night.

Song of T’aego Hermitage

I’ve lived in this hermitage
How long I don’t know
Deep and secret and
Without obstructions
Heaven and earth meet
Like box and cover:
There’s no turning toward
Or turning away.
I do not stay in the east, west,
South or north
The jewel tower and the jade palace
Do not stand opposite me.
I do not take guidelines from
Bodhidharma as a model
As the light shines freely through
Eighty four thousand gates.
- T’aego (1301-1382)

Poetry is God’s name pronounced in chimney smoke.

Like string theory, we weave moments of life into patterns of sweet fleeting touch.

Dimension beyond dimension saturate seeing with silence.

Each child carries poems running with words not yet read, not yet lived.

God is not-yet lived.

Un-I-dimensional.

Note: The Bookshop/Bakery will be closed Friday 31Oct, Saturday 1Nov, and Sunday 2Nov. We will re-open for Tuesday Evening Conversation 5:30pm Tuesday 4 Nov, Election Day. Remember to vote!

.............

The question of Gretchen was unasked, but there, in our conversation last evening.

"Please tell me what religion means to you
Although I think you very good and kind,
I doubt if worship weighs much in your mind."(Faust, Part I, by J.M. von Goethe, in Eternal Life? by Hans Kung, p.153)

Eve of All Saints, then All Souls. Those in and out of religion regard the elements of saintliness wherever they are found. Kindness, generosity, reverence, respect, integrity, self-transcendence, and humility -- among other attributes. Perhaps what we call faith is the willingness to admit 'I don't know...but I assent" to the mystery of love and truth seeking itself in the world.

Auferstehung (Resurrection)

Sometimes we get up
Get up as for a resurrection
In broad daylight
With our living hair
With our breathing skin.

Only the usual things are around us
No mirage of palm trees
With grazing lions
And gentle wolves.

The alarm clocks don't cease to tick
Their phosphorescent hands are not extinguished.

And yet weightlessly
And yet invulnerably
Ordered into mysterious order
Admitted early into a house of light.
(Poem by Marie Louise Kaschnitz)

The ordinary, when seen, and seen through, is the divine. Water, bread, wine, human touch, and nature's touch -- all things, all beings -- when completely themselves, are the elements and body of God. Last night at Thursday Evening Conversation the word "commensality" was read. "At table together," sharing food and familiar reality with all arriving at table. The notion (and sometimes practiced belief) that we are of one family, therefore, we nourish and sustain each other with food and drink, as and in, the presence of God.

Today we travel to western Massachusetts to spend final two days with Vera (Saskia's mom's dog) who will be put down on Monday. Hips and legs gone, Vera and her sorrowing mistress, Erika, will part for now.

Coming to visit
The Western Capital’s
Old, crumbling ruins,
Listen: Han Shan’s temple bell,
In the evening, tolling.
- Sengai Gibbon

When visiting Trappist monastery in Spencer these next 3 mornings, I'll hear bell along rolling farmland. Each tolling will bring to mind family and friends, relatives and strangers, who've traveled beyond as Vera will.

It is a weekend of thin veils. Heaven and earth, (or however we word that which seems to be separated into the dimensions of the seen-living and the unseen-gone-beyond), near and interpenetrate each other at this time of year. This nearing is celebrated variously but consistently in diverse cultures as symbolic of our continuing communion with all life – seen or unseen, felt or faith’d. .

My prayer this weekend -- that the intermingling joy and sorrow of our lives be honored:
And yet weightlessly
And yet invulnerably
Ordered into mysterious order
Admitted early into a house of light.

Good and faithful friends and companions lead the way!

In this instance, Verousch.

Our gratefulness.

After rain, sun this morning. Brook tumbles. Hosmer Pond reaches over its edge.

Talk about miracles and healing at Wednesday Evening Conversation. Wondering what the revelation of miracles might be. Even if disease is illusion, as some hold, the body passes from current form. It goes. Some say, 'We die.'

Revelation Must Be Terrible

Revelation must be
terrible with no time left
to say goodbye.

Imagine that moment
staring at the still waters
with only the brief tremor

of your body to say
you are leaving everything
and everyone you know behind.

Being far from home is hard, but you know,
at least we are exiled together.
When you open your eyes to the world

you are on your own for
the first time. No one is
even interested in saving you now

and the world steps in
to test the calm fluidity of your body
from moment to moment

as if it believed you could join
its vibrant dance
of fire and calmness and final stillness.

As if you were meant to be exactly
where you are, as if
like the dark branch of a desert river

you could flow on without a speck
of guilt and everything
everywhere would still be just as it should be.

As if your place in the world mattered
and the world could
neither speak nor hear the fullness of

its own bitter and beautiful cry
without the deep well
of your body resonating in the echo.

Knowing that it takes only
that one, terrible
word to make the circle complete,

revelation must be terrible
knowing you can
never hide your voice again.
(Poem by David Whyte, in Fire in the Earth)

On one level it must be terrible to learn that most of what we think and believe, just isn't true. Put another way, when we see things as they are -- something radical and uprooting takes place.

O.V. de L. Milosz writes: I have seen. He who has seen stops thinking and feeling. He can only describe what he has seen. (from "Canticle of Knowledge," in The Noble Traveller, p.173)

At the conversation Andy describes the death of his neighbor in an old trailer in the woods of Waldoboro. Andy tells the long story as ten others listen. Described are foot washing and radiant light filling the hovel-like death room of his neighbor. All thoughts of Christ, works of mercy, and easy judgemental opinions are made null by the stretch of encounter from diagnosis of liver failure to taking down of sole remaining picture of Jesus from stripped home after death. Andy tells the story well.

Certain natures receive from youth to old age the nourishment necessary for their inextinguishable passion: at first poetry, then metaphysics, and finally science -- but true science, the passionate and loving science of the Divine. (Milosz, in April 26, 1933 letter to Caffe de Broquery)

What is miracle? What is healing?

If truth is at root of everything, it is usually covered. Was it Dan Berrigan who said, "The point at which one can do nothing, the point of truth"? When break-through occurs it is a point at which one can do nothing.

'Doing nothing' is an awkward phrase. It evokes frowns of disapproval. 'Doing nothing,' suggests non-doing, no doer, and doerless activity. We know how to do something, but how do nothing? How arrive at the point of truth?

St. Augustine said in On Lying, "When regard for the truth has been broken down or even slightly weakened, all things will remain doubtful."

Much in our contemporary world remains in doubt. Truth feels optional. And yet, without truth as root and raison d'etre, other ways of being feel optional also -- namely, beauty, and love.

"I was born for this, I came into the world for this: to bear witness to the truth; and all who are on the side of truth listen to my voice."
"Truth?" said Pilate, "what is that?" (--John 18: 37)

Jesus remained silent.

What are we seeing?

What revelation?

One's voice?

Propinquity.

Staying near -- during this time.

We are not to end life to see God.

In a book called Village: Where to Live and How to Live, Peter Megargee Brown tells us that the secret to true happiness is "to want what we have." He talks about the concept of "propinquity," which helps explain why Naboth's vineyard was so tempting to Ahab. In villages we are close to many things, but we do not have to "own" them to enjoy them. We do not have to have a perfect schedule, or house, or garden, or routine, to keep sabbath. (p.68, in Sabbath Keeping, by Donna Schaper)

Nearness.

To find you, I moved beyond the city,
A wide path led me, by mulberry and hemp,
To a new-set hedge of chrysanthemums
Not yet blooming although autumn had come.
I knocked; no answer, not even a dog.
I waited to ask your western neighbor;
But he told me that daily you climb the mountain,
Never returning till sunset.
- Sen Chiao-jan

Walking Rockport harbor road Monday with Sando and Cesco we meet Tom with Halley. Rounding Beauchamp point Tom and Saskia are saying, "In today's culture we don't talk about death. People are afraid of the fear the conversation might stir." But stir the topic and fear falls away when neighbor listens to neighbor speak of life before and beyond death.

Time, and our fixation with saving time and equating time with money, mutes our longing to speak.

Schaper says, "Sabbath is setting aside time for God." (p.1)
It is conversation about death, what precedes and what follows, that nears us each to each.

Nearness of each other and awareness of death enlivens life, not the opposite.

When we talk of the resurrection of the body, we mean then, as the Catholic theologian Franz Josef Nocke expresses it, "that not only man's naked self is saved through death, when all earthly history is left behind, all relationships with other human beings become meaningless; bodily resurrection means that a person's life history and all the relationships established in the course of this history enter together into the consummation and finally belong to the risen person."

In other words, what is at stake here is not the continuity of my body as a physical entity and consequently scientific questions like those about the whereabouts of the molecules simply do not arise. What matters is the identity of the person. The question arises then of the permanent importance of my whole life and lot. "God loves more than the molecules that happen to be in the body at the time of death," says the Catholic dogmatic theologian Wilhelm Bruening, rightly. "He loves a body that is marked by all the tribulation and also be the ceaseless longing of a pilgrimage, a body that has left behind many traces in the course of this pilgrimage in the world which has become human through these very traces.... Resurrection of the body means that none of all this is lost to God, since he loves man. He has gathered together all dreams and not a single smile has escaped his notice. Resurrection of the body means that in God man discovers not only his last moment but his history."
...
By losing himself into the reality of God, man gains himself. By entering into the infinite, the finite person loses his limits, so that the present contrast of personal and impersonal is transcended and transformed into the transpersonal. If ultimate reality is not nothingness, but that All which we call God, death is not so much destruction as a metamorphosis: "vita mutatur, non tollitur," "life is changed, not ended," it is said in the preface of the Catholic requiem mass. It does not mean ending, still less perishing, but consummation; not a diminishing, but a fulfilling, infinite fulfillment.
(pp. 111-112, in Eternal Life? Life After Death as a Medical, Philosophical, and Theological Problem, by Hans Kung, c1984)

To live in propinquity -- that is, to live nearness -- is the origin of community, hospitality, and openness. As in Sen Chiao-jan's poem our neighbor knows our whereabouts. We are on the mountain. We are on the earth.

While we love our independence, (good neighbors but good fences) -- we long for interdependence, (faces with smiles, gates that open).

In our stubbornness we sometimes choose to end what might only require change.

Largely because we are heirs to a Roman imperial culture that controlled the writing of history, we are inclined to read Rome’s story through rose-colored lenses. We tend to see the march of the Roman Empire as a civilizing work of human progress. … But what if Roman imperial power itself, not in decline but at the peak, was the real darkness? … [For an entire century before and an entire century after Jesus’ life, Rome was engaged in war against the Jews in Israel. Around the time of Jesus’ birth, according to] scholars Richard Horsley and Neil Asherman Silberman: "The Roman armies had swept through many of the towns and villages of the country, raping, killing, and destroying nearly everything in sight. In Galilee, all centers of rebellion were brutally suppressed; the rebel-held town of Sepphoris was burned to the ground, and all its surviving inhabitants were sold into slavery." Thousands of Jews were killed. Villages in Galilee were laid waste. In Jerusalem, where rebels had briefly taken charge, the Romans showed the lengths to which they were prepared to go to maintain control by swiftly executing anyone even suspected of collusion in the rebellion. … The Roman means of execution, of course, was crucifixion. … This means that just outside the wall of the Jewish capital, crosses were erected – not three lonely crosses on a hill, as in the tidy Christian imagination, but perhaps two thousand in close proximity. On each was hung a Jew, and each Jew was left to die over several days. … And once squeezed free of life, the corpses were left on their crosses to be eaten by buzzards. (from Constantine’s Sword, pgs. 79-80, 83, by James Carroll )

Empires and empire builders first destroy then rebuild in their image. The close proximity, (the propinquity), of crosses fastened with bodies of those resisting imperial power in ancient Galilee -- and the bodies ripped by steel and explosives in current day Iraq, Israel, and Palestine -- are reminders to watch with wariness and name with unblinking courage the behavior of those who kill, destroy, and appropriate for themselves that which is their neighbor's.

We've been asked, some say commanded, to allow our neighbor to be who, where, and when they are. This "suffering, permitting, and allowing" is the meaning of the Latin "patior," and extends to "experience, undergo, and endure."

It is not easy to suffer gladly the foolish behavior of men seeking and taking power unto themselves at the expense of authentic understanding of who is "neighbor." Time is running out. Perhaps going with it are jealously, miserly witholding, and fear of strangers. It is time.

Prayer sets aside time, getting lost in the reality of God.

Prayer sees God through life.

Staying near during this time.

A ball in a corner for ten years. Or a rag doll picked up by hand or foot.

The Poustinia is a place of self-emptying. The will of God places and picks up who you are like ball, like rag doll.

The moon is a house
In which the mind is master.
Look very closely:
Only impermanence lasts.
This floating world, too, will pass.
- Ikkyu Sojun (1394-1481)

The small cabin filled with cold silence this October Saturday morning. Five of us on cushions -- that is, when Cesco wasn't licking noses of sitters with jikido attentiveness. (The jikido, or monk on daily duty, walks around the zazen hall carrying a flat paddle called a kyosaku, with which he taps the shoulders of zazen practitioners. Cesco uses nose and tongue.)

We read from Poustinia, Encountering God in Silence, Solitude and Prayer, two pages on Kenosis (self-emptying). Catherine Doherty's writes on the profound traditions of Christian spirituality surrounding the Russian word 'poustinia,' which means 'desert.'

Catherine's work at Madonna House and in print have led some to long for her canonization as saint.

Fr. Neuhaus is Editor-in-Chief of First Things magazine, and one of the outstanding thinkers and commentators in the Christian world today. In the December, 2000, issue of the magazine, he reflects on his first, and then a more recent visit to Madonna House.

“[Catherine’s] little book, Dear Father: A Message of Love to Priests, can be summed up: ‘Yes, but do you believe, do you really believe, the wonder of who Christ is and who you are for him? Show it! Live it!’ One is reminded of Chesterton’s remark that the only sin is to call a green leaf gray. Catherine railed against a world and a Church that seemed so indifferent to the luminosity of love.

“Poustinia, perhaps her most influential book, is a strongly moving account of a practice of silence, solitude, and prayer drawn from the Russian experience of pilgrimage and time apart in which a poustinik lives in a small hut—for days or months or years, or for a lifetime—in an isolation that is also total availability to the community. The heart of the poustinia is kenosis, joining Christ in the emptying of the self, as described by Paul in Phillipians 2. ‘I think that God calls the poustinik to a total purgation, a total self-emptying,’ writes Catherine. She cautioned against the impulse to be relevant by doing something useful as the world measures usefulness. ‘If you want to see what a “contribution” really is, look at the Man on the cross. That’s a contribution. When you are hanging on a cross you can’t do anything because you’re crucified. That is the essence of a poustinik. That is his or her contribution.’ Poustinia is one of the more insightful and disturbing books on prayer I have read in a long time.' (Testimonials from Catherine newsletter, re Catherine de Hueck Doherty)

Cesco and Sando run up the path toward brook.

Light colored Saab turns right onto Barnestown Road.

The tossing loveliness of ball and rag doll.

The will of God.

Emptying.

When in prison we dance with stillness.

Conversation encircles the willingness of each to speak from one's true self.

Today Hawkin's on Power vs. Force, Hillman on Yoga, Wilson on The Occult, as Yancey's What's So Amazing About Grace rested at middle of table.

Four of us gave space and freedom to each other.

From the banal to the noble, the silence and words from paper and mouths invite us to consider what is illuminating the very presence drawing us together.

We tap dance the power of presence down hallways of individual perception.

When we encounter hypothetical aggression or hostility, we practice stillness.

And allow God to find God's way into the world.

With gratitude each to each.

Truth is God.

That's what Mahatma Gandhi held.

Ahimsa, or non-violence, is truth in action.

For him, and for our consideration, truth and ahimsa are inseparable.

After Missing the Recluse on the Western Mountain

To your hermitage here on the top of the mountain
I have climbed, without stopping, these ten miles.
I have knocked at your door, and no one answered;
I have peeped into your room,
At your seat beside the table.
Perhaps you are out riding,
Or fishing, more likely, in some autumn pool.
Sorry though I am to be missing you,
You have become my meditation.
The beauty of the grasses, fresh with rain,
And close beside the window the music of pines,
I take into my being all that I see and hear,
Soothing my senses, quieting my heart;
And though there be neither host nor guest,
Have I not had a visit complete?
The afternoon fades, I make my way
Back down the mountain.
Why should I wait for you any longer?
- Ch-iu Wei

We disappear from each other. Presence, full and unhidden appearance, is where truth resides. Yet, disappearance feels more common than appearance. Just as lies feel more pervasive than truth.

If truth is God -- then we begin the path to seeing why lies endanger us as individuals and as nation. We are in danger of hiding from one another, and from God.

How do we pray, how do we tell ourselves, if we hide away from truth, hide away from God?

Why should I wait for you any longer, Lord God of All? I am surrounded by death, and those who would divide us from you. Lies are our constant companions.

Are we to be left desolate and separated by lies? Or will we find our true place in each others' lives? Are war, killing, and deception our only salvation? Or is there a greater truth that longs to emerge into appearance?

Bede Griffiths and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin spoke about a new vision:
Both felt that the articulating of a modern mystic vision was the primary need and objective of our time, and the central purpose of their own lives. Both felt that this needed to be paradoxically a unitive vision, in which "union differentiates." Thus Bede writes:

"Teilhard de Chardin always emphasized the principle that union differentiates. We become more ourselves as we enter more deeply into relationship with others...We do not lose ourselves, but we lose our sense of separation and division and discover our integral oneness in the One Reality. This is essentially a mystery of love...The whole process of evolution, as Teilhard Chardin saw it, is a process of personalization. The ultimate goal of humanity is a communion of persons in love...This is the meaning of Christian doctrine of the Trinity, that the ultimate Reality...is a communion of love (5)."

Bede in his later years, also through the influence of Teilhard, became committed to the integration of science (especially the "new physics" and Jungian psychology) into a dynamic unitive vision, "in a new evolutionary perspective" (6). Kathryn Spink rightly notes that "the principle of transformation was one which under the influence of Sri Aurobindo and Teilhard de Chardin [Fr. Bede] would eventually apply to life in general " [thus Fr. Bede wrote]: 'I see life in terms of transformation, matter being transformed into life, life into consciousness, and consciousness into divine experience'." (7). This line from Fr. Bede directly reflects the vision of Teilhard, though it expresses in more accessible terms Teilhard's noologistic language about cosmogenesis evolving into biogenesis into noogenesis. (Teilhard de Chardin and Bede Griffiths, By Robert Hale, OSB Cam, in THE GOLDEN STRING Newsletter, Vol. 7 No. 2 Spring 2001)

This process of transformation awaits awareness and opening of consciousness -- ours, and that of all creation.

Gandhi felt that truth alone exists.
The doctrine of Ahimsa, non-violence, was always at the very center of Gandhi's thought and work. He always believed in non-violence and lived by it. There was an obvious relationship between the doctrine of truth and non-violence: Satya and Ahimsa. As Gandhi says, I made the early discovery that if I was to reach God as truth and truth alone I could not do so except through a perfect vision of truth can only follow a complete realization of Ahimsa. To see the universal and all- pervading spirit of truth face to face one must be able to love the meanest of creation as oneself. Ahimsa is the farthest limit of humility. (My experiment with truth, p.401-2).

For Gandhi, Truth and Ahimsa are so intertwined that it is practically impossible to disentangle and separate them. As he puts it, Ahimsa is the means and Truth is the end. Thus, Ahimsa becomes our supreme duty and Truth becomes God. “Truth exists, it alone exists. It is the only God and there is but one way of realizing ".
(Collected works. vol 44, p. 59).

Thus, Ahimsa is the fundamental means by which Truth can be realized, that is, Moksha can be achieved. Ahimsa includes non-violence in thought, feeling and action and also means total humility, love, compassion and service. (from Gandhian Thoughts , http://channels.vandemataram.com/vindex.jsp?sno=12)

Moksha is final freedom -- salvation and liberation -- from our unawareness and hiddenness. This liberation is the freedom longed for in the deep center of all being and each being. We long to realize who we really are.

Have mercy on me, God, have mercy. My soul flies to you for refuge.
I will hide in the shelter of your wings until the time of ambush is past.
I will cry to God the Most High, to the God who cares for me.
(Psalm 56 (57) Morning prayer in time of affliction)

The ambush is upon us. The attack of opinion and noise, ideology and ice cold conviction, is all over us from airwaves and newsprint. God is redefined into war and power, falsity and lie. The souls of those seeking the true God are frightened by the deception and patronizing puppeteering that masquerades as privatized faith and divinity these days in our country and the larger world.

Is our visit to the recluse complete? Have we learned something on the mountain that answers the question, "Why should I wait for you any longer?"

Is God hiding within each and every one of us, each and every being, until our consciousness is transformed and we see, finally, who we really are in each other's lives?

If truth is God, then all truth is relational.

Alone with others. Union differentiates.

Nuptiality.

No retribution.

The Psalmist will state the sinner thinks, “there is no God, no retribution”.

Ahead the green creek sparkles
As it flows toward the cliff
A huge rock with a good edge for sitting
My heart is like a lone cloud
With nothing to depend on
So far away from the world’s affairs
What need is there
To search for anything
- Han-shan

I’ve been concerned about lies. My lies. The lies of the Bush administration. And, the great lie.

Like mountain ground in late October we are asked to live with lies as paths live with coverings of leaves.

Gathering Leaves

Spades take up leaves
No better than spoons,
And bags full of leaves
Are light as balloons.

I make a great noise
Of rustling all day
Like rabbit and deer
Running away.

But the mountains I raise
Elude my embrace,
Flowing over my arms
And into my face.

I may load and unload
Again and again
Till I fill the whole shed,
And what have I then?

Next to nothing for weight;
And since they grew duller
From contact with earth,
Next to nothing for color.

Next to nothing for use.
But a crop is a crop,
And who's to say where
The harvest shall stop?
(Poem: "Gathering Leaves," by Robert Frost, from The Poetry of Robert Frost (Holt, Rinehart and Winston).)

Sickness of heart at the distortions, selective emphases, and downright lies that fall from Bush and his handlers. Not just about Iraq. But also environment, economy, oil, corporate war profiteering, this administration’s dismantling of rights, fairness of representation, and disproportionate psychological disparagement of any opposing opinion.

Once we thought truth was God, and lies the opposite of God.

With what purpose, Lord, do you stay away, hide yourself in time of need and trouble?
The wicked in their pride persecute the weak, trap them in the plots they have devised.
The sinner glories in his desires, the miser congratulates himself.
The sinner in his arrogance rejects the Lord: “there is no God, no retribution”.
This is what he thinks – and all goes well for him.
Your judgements are far beyond his comprehension: he despises all who stand against him.
( Psalm 9B (10) Thanksgiving )

Still, I give thanks that even in God’s absence, we long for God.

We want those who try to hide God to go away. They will take money with them, but we want them to go away.

That’s all. God is love. And God is truth.

We must be with God. And with God is no retribution.

The sinner is right about no retribution.

As a fool I have to accept both Bush and God.

If one must go away, may the true one stay.

Next to nothing for color.

Next to nothing for use.

Why do fools love?

October koan.

Time is odd.

Who knows what time it is?

Time is not God.

"Sabbath is setting aside time for God." (Donna Schaper, in Sabbath Keeping).

Setting aside time, we surrender to what we do not know.

Despite the obstacles
I pursued the great monk
The misty mountains a million layers high
He pointed to the road back home
One round moon
Lantern of the sky
- Han-shan

The great monk is the height and depth of one's being. In pursuing the great monk we must first relinquish surface ephemera holding us to flat plane.

Prayer lifts and falls from the surface of things.

Prayer is attention. It is time gone and place abandoned.

Gone where? Abandoned to what?

To pray for a longer time is not the same as to pray by multiplying words, as some people suppose. Lengthy talk is one thing, a prayerful disposition which lasts a long time is another. For it is even written in reference to the Lord himself that he spent the night in prayer and that he prayed at great length. Was he not giving us an example by this? In time, he prays when it is appropriate, and in eternity, he hears our prayers with the Father.

The monks in Egypt are said to offer frequent prayers, but these are very short and hurled like swift javelins. Otherwise their watchful attention, a very necessary quality for anyone at prayer, could be dulled and could disappear through protracted delays. They also clearly demonstrate through this practice that a person must not quickly divert such attention if it lasts, just as one must not allow it to be blunted if it cannot last.
(from A letter to Proba by St Augustine)

We pray when attention lingers on true longing. Not desires, nor wishes; not hopes, nor beliefs.
There is a longing that is true and more than true. It abides with us. It dwells as the essence of our existence.
Prayer is engagement with what is -- right there, before and behind, above and below -- ordinary sacred.

This longing is for that which is -- for what and who we are.
We ask and ask again: Who am I? Who are we?

This is where poem arises.

A poem should be motionless in time
As the moon climbs

A poem should be equal to:
Not true--
(Archibald MacLeish, in Ars Poetica )

I remember today my sister. It is the fourth anniversary. Her son, Mark, writes: ‘Today should not be a day of sadness for us, but one of celebration -- Mom turns 4 today!’ Her daughter, Lori Ann, writes: 'I was awake this morning at 1:02am and sat in silent prayer.'

Birth and death -- these two expressions of life -- visit one another.

Finding life -- is equal to -- itself.

Where time is set aside.

And God is still.

The road back home.

Here and now.

Submission.

She is reading the Koran. She reminds me that submission is the heart of prayer.

Why in our fear of not praying as we should, do we turn to so many things, to find what we should pray for? Why do we not say instead, in the words of the psalm: I have asked one thing from the Lord, this is what I will seek: to dwell in the Lord’s house all the days of my life, to see the graciousness of the Lord, and to visit his temple? There, the days do not come and go in succession, and the beginning of one day does not mean the end of another; all days are one, simultaneously and without end, and the life lived out in these days has itself no end.
So that we might obtain this life of happiness, he who is true life itself taught us to pray, not in many words as though speaking longer could gain us a hearing. After all, we pray to one who, as the Lord himself tells us, knows what we need before we ask for it. (from A letter to Proba by St Augustine)

I have asked only one thing from the Lord.

This...do I seek.

To dwell as and where I am. In the very house of God.

Day by day we bless you, Lord: we praise you for ever and for ever. (from the Te Deum)

And although I have not yet surrendered, I can still pray.

I submit. Underwith. Undergone.

Underway.

At hand.

That's what Luke the Evangelist wrote. "Say to them, 'The reign of God is at hand.'"

In my house there is a cave
In the cave there’s nothing at all
Pure emptiness
Really wonderful
Glorious and splendid
Bright as the sun
Vegetarian fare nourishes this old body
Cotton and hides cover this illusory form
Let a thousand saints appear before me
I have the Dharmakaya for my very own
- Han-shan

Dharmakaya, for Buddhists, is full. Dharmakaya is home.

Dharmakaya (Dhar?ma?ka?ya) (?), n. [Sanskrit, dharma Law + -kaaya body. [w] san-lun, [p] san1lun4, [k] samnon, [j] sanron.]
1. The dharmakaya (fa-shen ) is the experience of the transcendence of form of the five senses - and realization of true thusness.
2. the Buddha body in its self-nature, which is the same as the dharma body;
3. The Dharma body (fa-shen) is considered to be the eternal indestructible true principle, the Buddha's original body.
4. 1. Dharmakaya (body of the great order); the true nature of the Buddha, which is identical with reality, the essential laws of the universe. Equal to the laws of physics. The Dharmakaya is the experience of the unity of the laws of physics. It represents the "law" (dharma), the teaching expounded by the Buddha.
5. The Experience is timeless, permanent, devoid of characteristics and free from duality. It is the spiritual body of the buddhas, their true nature, which all buddhas have in common. (http://www.selfknowledge.com/109716.htm)

We celebrate St. Luke today. He was a convert to Christ.
And remain in the same house, eating and drinking what they provide, for the labourer deserves his wages; do not go from house to house. (Luke 10)

When at home there is no need to go from house to house. To be at home is wherever one is. Whenever completely "with" or "as," we are home. Whether with another, or, as oneself -- home is where we dwell not as two, nor with one. Home is nuptial. Not two. Not one. Rather, each as each, each with each.

Beloved brothers, our Lord and Saviour sometimes gives us instruction by words and sometimes by actions. His very deeds are our commands; and whenever he acts silently he is teaching us what we should do. For example, he sends his disciples out to preach two by two, because the precept of charity is twofold-love of God and of one’s neighbour.
The Lord sends his disciples out to preach in two’s in order to teach us silently that whoever fails in charity toward his neighbour should by no means take upon himself the office of preaching. (from A homily by Pope St Gregory the Great)

To preach is to be what we are saying.

We wonder what our global village would be like if we took time to listen to what everyone was saying – no matter what the language. In every conversation, the silences speak more truthfully than the words. Do we know how to listen for the Silence which allows the Word to be heard?

As hermits and solitaries we may wonder what we should do when senseless wars, boundless greed, overweening arrogance determines the future of our beloved earth. Perhaps it is our job to insure that there IS enough silence for the Word to be heard? Can we cultivate quiet so the Voice of Love can silently seep into our anguished, anxious hearts and teach us ways of compassion, forgiveness and mercy?

What can we do? “(We) have been told what is good, and what the Lord requires of (us):… only to act justly, love tenderly and walk humbly with our God.” (Micah 6:8) (from "A Word from Still Wood" in Raven's Bread, Food for Those in Solitude, Vol: 7 No: 2 May 2003)

This is what we are.

We are to act justly. We are to love tenderly. We are to walk humbly.

With God.

When are two not two? When is one not one? We ask ourselves.

Rain falls on everything this Saturday morning.

The response is at hand.

Promise and hope dissolve into fact.

Generally speaking, practical application of Zen requires detachment from thoughts. This method of Zen saves the most energy. It just requires you to detach form emotional thoughts, and understand that there is nothing concrete in the realms of desire, form, and formlessness; only then can you apply Zen practically. If you try to practice it otherwise, it will seem bitterly painful by comparison.
- Foyan (1067–1120)

Fact finalizes fanciful thought of Red Sox and Cubs.

This form filled with temporary sadness.

We are left with Friday morning.

Brook rushes past hermitage.

Dazed yellow leaves rest on ground after strong gale yesterday.

Cubs lose. Sox extend.

There’s a master who feeds on rosy clouds
He lives concealed from common wanderers
No matter what the season, it’s really restful
The summer is very much like the fall
Hidden streams are always gurgling
The wind murmurs in tall pines
Sit here for half a day
And you’ll completely
Forget a hundred year’s woes.
- Han-shan

The original face we show, the one before mother and father were born, is the face in our mirror.
Seeing this face, we are prepared to hear Jesus' words, "Before Abraham was, I am."
He saw through the koan.

Seeing through our own face, we see.

What?

Entering the inquiry, we are what is seen.

From every side, in and out, above and below, seeing and seen.

Holograph -- entirely handwritten by author.

Holy words.

One's own.

Sign on door today:

Closed Today
(Gott sei dank)

Open at 5:00pm
for Evening Conversation

..............

There's a stillness in October's quiet light today.

Walking meditation.

Canoe.

And gratitude.

Red Sox and Yankees even up at 2 each.

In baseball there is no attaining mastery. There is only one play at a time. One pitch, one swing, one set of movements at a time.

Do not say, “I understand! I have attained mastery!” If you have attained mastery, then why are you going around asking other people questions? As soon as you say you understand Zen, people watch whatever you do and whatever you say, wondering why you said this or that. If you claim to understand Zen, moreover, this is actually a contention of ignorance. What about the saying that one should “silently shine, hiding one’s enlightenment?” What about “the path is not different from the human mind?” - Foyan (1067–1120)

Walking Whitney Road loop through Lincolnville in sweet colorful sunlight this afternoon.

There's no knowing any outcome.

Go out. Come back. See. Then say what is seen.

Or keep silent.

As Sherman did at table in wheelchair as we greeted him in white house on Eaton Ave prior to walk.

Eyes alone in response.

Buddhists use hermitage for retreat this weekend. Nice they're here.

Sitting alone in peace
Before these cliffs
The full moon is
Heaven’s beacon
The ten thousand things
Are all reflections
The moon originally
Has no light
Wide open
The spirit of itself is pure
Hold fast to the void
Realize its subtle mystery
Look at the moon like this
This moon that is the heart’s pivot
- Han-shan

Maybe the world is a hologram. Brain too. Used The Holographic Universe by Michael Talbot at prison conversation Friday.

Who or what is the seeing?

'Beloved, the illumined soul sees clearly that from the One Life comes forth all living things, and that there is no separation possible when man lives and moves and has his being in his Divine Source. Therefore, the words "I and the Father are One", are fully realized to be Truth.' (p.116, in Your God is My God by Gladys De Meuter, c.1965)

The Source is with us.

October joyful sunlight!

Reality is not what we think it is.

Wanting to go to the eastern cliff
Setting out now after
How many years
Yesterday I used the vines
To pull myself up
But halfway there
Wind and mist made
The going tough
The narrow path grabbed
At my clothes
The moss so slippery
I couldn’t proceed
So I stopped right here
Beneath this cinnamon tree
Used a cloud as a pillow
And went to sleep
- Han-shan

Reality is how we see it as.