3 posts tagged “poetry”
For generosity, nothing to do,
Other than stop fixating on self.
For morality, nothing to do,
Other than stop being dishonest.
For patience, nothing to do,
Other than not fear what is ultimately true.
For effort, nothing to do,
Other than practice continuously.
For meditative stability, nothing to do,
Other than rest in presence.
For wisdom, nothing to do,
Other than know directly how things are.
--translated by Ken McLeod
Thus have I heard: in the heaven of Indra
(that bellicose old storm god, drinker of soma)
hangs a net of pearls, made with such skill
that each pearl holds the image of every other
reflected in its surface, and if you look
you see in every shining image
again the image of all the others:
thus deeper and deeper it goes.
Thus says the Avatamsaka Sutra,
a garland of enlightened knowledge.
Thus do I know: In the forest of the druids
(those mysterious white-clad druids)
there stands a grove of trees
in a circle; from each tree
there run paths to every other tree,
and the leaves of all the trees are mingled
in the open space between. Birds
fly to and fro, and wild beasts walk
between the great trunks, and the sky
is always open overhead. They say
if you follow all the paths from one tree
to another, every path and every tree,
you will see that each tree is the One Tree,
the tree that grows at the center, from which
all paths come and to which they go, where
every bird roosts safely, and the wild beasts
rest in its shade.
Thus says the Ogham, a grove of trees
in a bag, a handful of letters, a secret
growing in the open like a tree.
Here is one of my favorite poems. Every so often I must foist it on share it with my readers.
Wild Geese
by Mary Oliver
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting--
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
