free.

do not
return

to
chaos

only
so many lives

there
one
not another

c h a n g e l i n g

self(s)


mouse(s)

anonymous
affirmation


we
the fifth fin

ventral
voiced

d e c e m b e r n o t e s

B R U S H ( E S )

In Kimora, Hiroshima prefecture
seek shodo brushes
tanuki, sheep, goat, the tail of a horse
there you will feather brushes to flush ink
turkey, ptarmigan. the sparrow's tail

hair falls
and flight
to sign
and copy
the paint out
write what's within
assisted by
this
man whose hands
made these

______________

m u s i c (bokaro, wagakki)

a koto's sound is bigger
more resonant

samisen

end blown shakuhachi

fui
____________________

E N O S H I M A     I S L A N D
ENOSHIMA-DAISHI TEMPLE

there is here a training centre for esoteric Buddhism
Kukai's Shingon
Kukai,
(who perhaps remains suspended between life and death)

waiting for Maitreya

Enoshima-Daishi temple
continuously prays
led by Master Ekan
who  "accomplished previously untrodden
the Goma in which 1 million wooden sticks were burned"
or
by Master Gosen
his leading disciple
known as the "completer of
the incantation method of Kokomo Jumonji-ho"
that is
chanting mantras
1 million times over 100 days.

Ekan and Gosen conduct the Goma-ritual
"the desperate act"
or so called
by ordinary monks.

During the Goma-ritual,
one challenges the body and soul
in front of a flame over 3 meters high.

The Masters always hope that all peoples of the world
rest in peace
have wishes granted.

Soka!


_________________________________________________

the absence of

focus

lumens

snow first in fifty-four years

how it fell -

students said
it's coming down
around shoes
white paper
dying as clear water

(thanksgiving)

a pumpkin pie, half eaten
always bought two
for you

first person argument
emotional vespers

an empty an(d) image (moved by)

an empty an(d) image

A path of birds

there is this

ajar
a jam
a jolt


just below

if loved
it does
and has

above Noborito
the biggest moon in 70 years

to the station with these two young men
friends who've tolerated
a canal walk to nowhere

karin
the chinese quince
an aroma so
sweetly autumn
on three continents

warm melon pan
and
the smell of grilled meat

bats

down to a meter it flew
in warm air, little light
near the persimmons
and roadside shrine bibbed in red

instead of sleeping, they eat,
drawing water and meat from air.

not one of them downed.

only one of us looking up.

Sleepless, Kanagawa - advice

If it's a night sleep cannot find you,
lay awake in a room
of stones and water.
At four, a door opens upstairs.
Footsteps clod across that floor, which will lift you up to dawn.
Note the wet garden, near.
Follow the first bird,
inquisitive.

No
when so divided.

Read
Jabberwocky
and Hopkins.

That is what we grieve for.

she:
" 9/11 and 11/9
the two worst days
in recent American history."

S a g a m i

 a tomcat foot bone (talus) dated to 200 AD found in a grave with burnt human remains near Kastrup in southern Jutland

drawing upon the water
painting ink and white
so long left and now returned

the eyes are still stunned, shunted, unclear
yes occasionally the filters fall
and all
seems here
and clear

think again
place
en plein air

remains of

beowulf, ˈbeɪəˌwʊlf 

ˈʧɔːsə,ˈʧɔsər 

powys 
ˈpaʊəz 


(remains)

ðiː , ði remains

ðəʊz , ðoʊz

ðeə. ðɛr.

ðæt (remain)

ðɪs  (remains)

ˈʌðə, ˈʌðər 

truːθ , truθ 

ˈhæznt, ˈhæzənt

ʧeɪnʤd (remains)

æz truːðz duː 

æz truθs du  

ˈ

obdurate
meditation
perseverance
working hard

at

thes
the
these
this


ðɪs

の

waxing crescent
walnut ink


Kakure(hidden)
infra dig (beneath one's dignity)


forgotten in the dark


let light



in

this simple life is not
the
buckling banks
beneath
me

sea tossed and torn away

this, another round of
flotsam accumulation

grief surged, spent is
surf's phlegm
or river's hem

isn't picturesque this

mudlarking

there isn't

a lost or a bust

but a plus

to soul ending worry gone

now it's just

and tales

are

day in
day out
one step
one


this is enough

yanaka

ほうき Hōki (broom)

Voiced, unvoiced, here

Present
responsive
(absent flippancy)
uneasy upended ness
pressed to
such an aspired extant
that
tongue teething
(voiced dental fricative as in ð, this)
 not tied

tried ten times, staying,
still

ðis

stood (or would've)

while longer lessons

listed, left

cloze

It's not easy to _____________
but this is how the __________
and when _________________
then

you do____________________
as
or if it

matters.

remember, he said, you are a good writer

i fed on this

diacritic

a particle physic

is it

is   it

two persimmons
for the price of one walk
along the dark stream

odakyu suicide

LED at the station
reads accident

walking down the mountain

such sun
spun silk


all this
left
less than
one hour ago


didn't care
or thought it best not to.

Ono no Komachi

after her

5

7

5

a response that

7,7

likely

100

is lost to

18

lives on

833

857

no more no less

basho-an

listening to

one death leads to another

one life
one

49 degrees, last quarter

your photo from 5 years ago
your eyes I shared just yesterday with Eloise
I've walked thrice crying

Interdependent communities raise out of suffering and death. - Ernst Mayer

last quarter, orionid aftermath

revising memories of memory

integrating
the single human hair
that is our history

into this reflection of falling light

which leads back
into the light
that left us here.

(the cultivation of)


koku
han

rice
wage


(the division of)

daimyô
fudai 

tozaka

shinpan

Edo Meiji

Showa Hesei

Macarthur quartered

rice into washi

as inflowing ends

build

Tama outflow

sluice

this fore

anglered as

an out into

though

risen

(lento)

as through

to
to

and

entering

extends

as it is moved

moving

outward

a raptor spurned, turns away
as crows murder fish

grebe and grey heron hunt as seine and spear

cormorant collapsing into river

a roost,

trembling wing-fluttering boughs and branches

waking, as rivers do

along water

(three siphons)

a Thames digger near Tama

children arrange stones and pick grasses

an ancient woman and two old men
gather walnuts

(two)

fat tick and black butterfly

hinterland

let go
in every direction
birth and aging
renew and reduce
is was will be

loose the tense of it

to see
to say
I was
this

that left its mark
between us

opuscule

shiro-an daifuku

two

the color of

d u s s e h r a

Vijayadasami (Sanskrit: विजयदशमी) also known as Dussehra (Sanskrit: दशहरा) 

removing ten bad qualities within ...Vijaya or victory

Ahankara                          ego

Amanavta                        cruelty

Anyaaya                          injustice

Kama Vasana                  lust

Krodha                             anger

Lobha                              greed

Mada                               excessive pride

Matsara                           jealousy

Moha                               attachment

Swartha                           selfishness 

.

the grackle*, the emmet*

start and stare.

to fore, dretney.

grackle = Devon dialect for outsider
emmet = Cornish for outsider
dretney = Cornish pronoun. of directly

His Gaelic forearms

Hebrew knees

a Kufi tress,
less 
than
breath away.

Gert lush!

I   の

am his now

as dreams allow.

gert lush = Bristolian for excellent

egret

careful among the wide awake
you step the stream or
wing a short distance.

we, surprised by your
close yellow feet,
keep walking

three eyes, midnight, clay, sea
a channeled triangulation
above water

new moon

the pairs

dead bird beads (prayer)

goosefoot

All processes are out of my control. When one sees this with understanding, one is disillusioned with suffering.
20.279. Dhammapada


Will I lose everything?

It is the terror of uncertainty,
of doubt.

In the cool darkness of morning
I remember
everything was lost from the beginning.

Better to love the blinding light
the smell of cows and laundry
to savor bread
and singing
than to fill the mind
with hungry ghosts.

Wandering off, far and wide. Alone.
(3.37 Dhammapada)


Lizards swallowed a white horse.
There's a swallow as big as a bear in the cypress tree.

It's the light.
Magnifies, encourages optical misjudgements.

You can taste the bitter herbs in the olives here.

Nine times the bell strikes,
and the thin air flings further, wider than imagined.

The brutal blue sky!

f i r s t

I worked through midday exhaustion and came out into evening with them - words.
One following another.
Kurosawa cautioned work, work, word. Not to be afraid of something....what? Does it matter?
work, work, write.

First. 

pluck out desire, as one does a spent blossom.


turn
turn

and go

"Doubt can be as powerful and sustaining as certainty. When you are lost, you are not alone."

- Doubt (2008) film

(waxing gibbous)

"One's own misdirected thoughts do more harm than any enemy or ill-wisher"
3.42





mispronouncing difficulty.

it's in the

the great doubt within
so thick you cannot see
road
feet
soul
so vast you wonder if you ever had anything
but this


.

so much joy in the naming of

Violence - Where is that man so restrained by shame that he avoids laziness like the racing horse a whip?

- Dhammapada 10.143



moon waning crescent

rising

(eighty degrees at noon)

a sleepless night

stacking and diminishing insoluble pieces of

there is a risk of
this umbrous underneath
outlasting the
race

بنت

Daughter is an old word
a bone
washed out of Afar or Transvaal
crept north
in a borne basket
changing constellations.

Here - her

bone I've found
on the shore of Calypso

made legs
north.

It's cold to the _____
in Lund.

Still she'll run
to safety

as far as
as often as

she
transitting

can.

lessening more

leaving pier

full moon

one's own
(solitude)

 could it be otherwise?

so far from turtle island

without halt or stutter
unbridled

there's pain here
and growth

but in a different garment
than settlement

I found here shibori haori

each knot remembers net
that nearly drowns us

yet scattered hexagons
becomes turtles' backs
in another sea

mind sum

rain
rain
and
waxing moon

c o n t i n u i t y

mooring perpetually -

homeless woman at Noborito
basking in the morning light
her drink swollen calves and ankles
sun dark and reptilian

n a m b u l i n e s

for 2 days the 2 of us see a man enter the car
and peel off, discard the warning signs from the train doors


two doors open

beside us the monk giving dharma talk on the smartphone
next to the man reading asleep
next to the sleeping woman
head lolled so far back
I see her fillings

kurasai

we pass Fuji but never see it

below us two buddhas are fishing

today we found a hornet dying


far from the flooded fields
two doors open

the scale oscillates
sleeping, awake
clearly we are damaged

all the while i hold the grip
and think of Jupiter's storms

d r e a m - ikura desuka

I'm two rivers. confluent westward and north.

I've drought, memento mori, scant ablutions.

My voice  sunken, liquid. 

How much is never said.

But it's there,  

underneath the bed of stones.

Even rivers drink salt tea. 

 

2 d r e a m s

1

a gold ring
a yellow container

I cannot move your color from my mind

2

they are at the window, our friends
with a message
behind a curtain I am changing
I ask you to answer
but you are playing music
so loud
I can hear it through your headphones
I ask again and again for you to help me
to listen to their message
you glare at me

those blue eyes

I,  frantically pulling on clothes,
motion to the window
I can't hear you
I can't hear you
I try to turn off the machine and topple the player

you still staring

lift it up and throw it at me

obscurantum

your father working to the bone
brother at home

my country

losing  the middle of the middle (lost the lower years ago)

those of us that can leave

no future there where

it's a murk, work

less educated answers
and demagogic drudges
doing all the talking

by the feet of the water

hebi

m a r i a 1

nones (novena)
stabat mater
remainder
reef (grief)
forgiveness
stele (stolen from)
eternity
you as twin (ma ríe)
nearly (you)

polarise
dying estuaries into
ossuaries -  twin burial
lose nothing but

you are (llorar)

sanctity
thinking
keening
kneeling
longing for

la Dolorosa

Last night, while giving a lesson online, I felt visitors.

There were walking in the galley kitchen, opening the fridge, inspecting.

From the loft, they peered down, observing, reflected in the computer screen.

Yakata clad.

Male.

Indeterminate age.

tracing track

He won't come back.

Shakyo shock me
into the out of to

the less so.
 
Help me let go of though.


Through is tough.

plucky rooster walks, advancing.

caution.

I cannot stop it
or anyone
chicken or corpse.

so why not step to grief?

what crows?

is it your life and your death?

what conflates?

nothing.

everything.

to stay

simply  in this.

recuerdo

April 22, 2011

Wisconsin daffodils can teach us a thing or two about perseverance in the face of adversity. 

Mine have survived 2 hail storms and clumsy sleepy woodchucks.

4 lines, 4 days

Abeunt studia in mores       pursuits become habits

Communis est linea            everyday a line

Doceret the                         It is oneself who is hard to teach.  12.159 Dhammapada

___________________

Bhikku says abandon anger,
give up pride.

What is it, this, you?

Come away from doubt alive.


Bhikku says the rain cannot break into the mind
made meditative.
Desire remains
It always remains.


Anyone who has not been caught in a downpour is a liar.


Let the rain come.
Let us learn compassion for
even ourselves.

Not to do before doing is done a gift.

rooms and rooms and rooms
I want 2
one for sharing with self and others
one for art

it's nine o'clock. the world is walking and so am i.

I woke up keening for the fear of it.

Realignment.

I will make a barrow holding a lifetime of things underneath.
(including you, my love, a modest Tutankhamen)

I am the rising toward pilgrimage, adrift between three continents.

brown creeper

a sneeze or spiral of

moon
first quarter

man feeds oats to hissing goose

an apology

Spring whispers from a brighter world.

expressed from delicate protuberances
canals of thin air
clouded cataracts rinsing the deep edges of

winter
(ends)

house finches, two
moon waxing crescent
27 degrees

if the particular isn't particular what is it?

the pain of (endings)

A flower falls, even though we love it; and a weed grows, even though we do not love it.

- Dogen

In the darkness before an April dawn, a male robin sings first one note, then another - descant, diminuendo, ascent. The sound so clearly signals light. It is a sound of light.

Thrush is the birdsong  familiar. It is also the common infection of throat and mouth, white over rosy-fingered, a yeasty crust. Cries! The subject sound is introduced by one to the other, a linked awareness of lift and pain. Joy and suffering met will be met, made as we are, endlessly.

What else endlessly to end and begin? How many languages, species, stars?

Death suffers life and life suffers death. What seems particular is hardly so. Mother Seen running  after headless dinner in the garden. Grandfather Swore in bed, bumped his head, and didn’t get up in the morning. Grandmother Asphyxia left a twin snail trail of bloodied knees. The comatose dims into the vegetative, even the strongest bodies are twigged and broken. 

I once found a motorcyclist’s foot, severed at ankle like an oxtail, still in its boot. 

We all fall down the chimney. Children know it so well.

Duck, duck, goose. Ring around the rosy. 

Ashes, ashes.

We fuel the liminal fire, inexhaustible. 

You, left in light filled rooms, are next, will always be next.

RSVP. 

Mysteries ineffable. Why do friends we love leave, or we them?

Suffering. Stay with it, listen. Kindness is strength, and faultless. 

Can we  grow a life and readily dig into it?

Or baptised return to water, residual powder?

Confluences.

Under the earth is more earth, every sea a boneyard. 

the pain of (endings)

a cappella

(to an ear equivalent to)

moktok

108 cold notes

rising

with the sun.

B o s t o n

You called me kind tonight.
How much and secretly I needed to hear those words!

Prodigal son,
I leave you tenderness.

Do or don't remember me.

I will love you.

Your
suffering

causes pain.

Scorn me
and I, torn,
remain convinced,
compassionate.

Fold further into suffering.

Facing desolation.

Open. Free.

it is so quiet and beautiful here
birds
the wind around cars
far boat
bridge
my breath
the key taps
the clock

a cough outside


dhamma says live free from hatred
live free