Zen poetry
It may well be difficult to run a thread on zen poetry given the forum rules and restrictions on quotes, cut and paste etc. But many zen poems, particularly haiku, are very short........so I/we might get away with it. :smile:
Of poetry in general, Jane Hirshfield writes that great art and poetry is "a truing of vision.........a changing of vision. Entering a good poem, a person feels, tastes, hears, thinks, and sees in altered ways................by changing selves, one by one, art changes also the outer world that selves create and share." Here is a poem by Lai Ded (14th century)....... I was passionate filled with longing, I searched far and wide. But the day that the Truthful One found me, I was at home. On another note, there is a long tradition in Japanese zen of masters writing Death Poems. When they suspect that their time is up, or will be very soon, they reach not for bottle or the anti-depressants, but for the pen! Here is one example.... Bury me when I die beneath a wine barrel in a tavern. With luck the cask will leak (We all need a sense of humour at times, even zen masters) Here's another, with less humour...... Death poems are mere delusion — death is death. Yet nothing beats a haiku. One to finish...... For those who proclaim they've grown weary of children, there are no flowers. |
You would think if something was from the 14thc ---it would be ok to paste!
Right? Bury me when I die beneath a wine barrel in a tavern. With luck the cask will leak Lol! |
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Yogananda's chants are now free of copyright. Some old tv shows as well. For zen poetry I would just write my own. I'll try: frozen lake footsteps in the snow who passed by this way? no one I know walking was easy for empty were my sacks looking down i noticed my feet made those tracks |
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Three hundred people onboard
The fly is trapped I tell him, follow me out the door He lands in the tip of my nose. (A true story) |
Late, lost and alone
Ah, a puppy! |
You stop to point at the moon in the sky
by Ryokan English version by Sam Hamill Original Language Japanese You stop to point at the moon in the sky, but the finger's blind unless the moon is shining. One moon, one careless finger pointing -- are these two things or one? The question is a pointer guiding a novice from ignorance thick as fog. Look deeper. The mystery calls and calls: No moon, no finger -- nothing there at all. |
"No moon, no finger - nothing there at all"
Dogen:- (to whom I am besotted....:smile: ) Before one studies Zen, mountains are mountains and waters are waters; after a first glimpse into the truth of Zen, mountains are no longer mountains and waters are no longer waters; after enlightenment, mountains are once again mountains and waters once again waters.” .......to come back to where we started and know it for the first time |
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Looking out the window I take a deep breath Oh look an unskillful thought arises The joys of forum life |
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