The Americanization of Zen ~ Gael
Hodgkins and Bill Devall Heart Song ~ Mitch Trachtenberg In the Lineage of Good Company ~ Lynda McDevitt
Skip the car! ~ Barry Evans Dharma Gates Are Boundless: A Sangha Column ~ edited by Michael Quam Buddhist Peace Fellowship: In the News
Gael Hodgkins and Bill Devall In the following essay, Gael Hodgkins and Bill
Devall present a
provocative set of issues and questions regarding the Americanization
of Zen. In future issues of Rin Shin-ji Voices we will reserve space for creative
and lively responses (notice we didn’t say reactions) on this general
topic. So, please send your own thoughts, and please,
for editorial
reasons, keep
your responses under 1000 words. We look forward to a long
conversation, rich and deep, in the pages of this journal. (The
Editors) “The Americanization of Zen” is the topic we were asked to address by
the editorial board of Rin Shin-ji Voices. Further,
it was suggested that the article be an introductory one, laying out
some of the broader issues this topic inspires and serving as a
“launching point for an ongoing dialogue for future newsletters.” Overarching this thought-provoking subject is Shakyamuni Buddha’s
reasons for teaching the dharma. It will be remembered that after his
enlightenment, he was reluctant to teach what he had learned because
he thought his teaching would not be understood. The god Brahma
appeared to him and reminded him that “there are beings with but
little dust in their eyes” and so the Buddha Shakymuni went on to
teach for 40 years. In more than one place in the Pali Canon he
asserted his motivation to be “for the welfare and happiness of the
multitude, out of compassion for the world, for the benefit, welfare
and happiness” of all sentient beings. Following his dharma, it is
suggested that the Americanization of Zen be considered with this
teaching in mind: What provides for the welfare and happiness of all
sentient and non-sentient beings? Suggested Questions for dialogue
Case Example The use of the kyosaku (“The Stick”) is an example
of one part of practice which is dropping off in Americanized Zen.
This accommodation to American culture is worth noting because it
resonates with other of the broader issues we have chosen for
discussion: authority, individuality, puritanism. A story is related
by Karen Mueller who heard it from Reb Anderson who was witness to it
at Tassajara. During sesshin, the kyosaku was being used liberally,
with the wielder going up and down the aisles whacking students. When
he came to one student (male), that student whirled around, grabbed
the stick by its opposite end, and threw the wielder and student onto
the zendo floor in a tussel. The monk in charge, failing in his
effort at equanimity, dropped his jaw and sat stupefied. Thus came about, intentionally or unintentionally, an example of the
Americanization of Zen.
These examples show changes in zen in America but they also raise the
question of how change happens. Is it spontaneous? Does a teacher
make the change? Is it voted on? Does American pragmatism contribute
to the “Americanization of Zen”? ISSUES IN AMERICAN ZEN
Introduction Over ten years ago authors of an article in The
Pacific World: Journal of The Institue of Buddhist Studies
wrote that, “The present day challenge to all of Buddhism is to adapt
the essence of the teachings so it is more appropriate to the new
audience, as well as to the rapidly changing audience within.”
Although a definition of “Americanization” is
difficult, that statement adequately addresses the question. A simpler
definition is “adaptation to American culture” and the elements of
American culture we have chosen to lay out include: the Commercialization of Zen; American Precursors; Feminism; Puritanism
and Fundamentalism; Informality; Power/Authority, Majority, Consensus;
Social Justice; Science and Technology; Social Class; and Race.
Power/Authority, Majority, Consensus
Social Justice
We see this reflected in Alan Senuake’s devotion to the teachings of
Martin Luther King, Jr. and in the Buddhist Peace Fellowship. Zen
Buddhists are engaged in prison work, care for the homeless and
witnessing for peace. Early on in Maylie’s visits here, she initiated
an AZG chapter of BASE (Buddhist Alliance for Social Engagement), and
she herself was an ardent activist both in Berkeley and in Arcata.
The 1995 issue of The Pacific World was
a “Special Issue on Buddhism, Medicine, Science, and Technology.” A
salient section offers a rationale for considering the relation
between science and “other systems of thought.” The article,
“Comparing Science and Buddhism,” states, “Because science, whatever
its faults and limitations, is the dominant intellectual mode in our
world, other systems of thought must establish some relationship to
science. To understand a previously remote idea system [Buddhism
implied], one must see how it does or does not resemble more familiar
world views.”
As we were finishing this essay, a sangha member forwarded a
newspaper article about Shin Buddhism in America, also known as Pure
Land (see The New York Times, June 13, 2006, “Buddhism
With a New Mind-Set"). A bishop in that “church” “began offering
meditation several years ago because 60 percent of the people who
called his temple were asking about it.” Clergy members, he said, “are
supposed to respond to the needs of the people” and “any program
including meditation, tai chi, yoga, anything which makes people feel
comfortable, or willing to step into the temples, should be offered.” So, for the welfare and happiness of all beings, what should the
Arcata Zen Group be offering? “The Americanization of zen” is an unfinished story.
Twittering Machine Paul
Klee,
1922
This is what he told his friend Sophie,
who worried way too much. "Sophie, it's all one: the stuff
that's happened and the stuff that hasn't happened yet. These
differences and boundaries? We're making them up. All paths to wisdom
have been there before us and will be there after us. We're not
creating them, just tuning in. They're neither good nor bad --
they're just reality. Their goodness or badness is just our own trip.
You think there's you and it? There isn't: there just *is*. (And
there isn't even that.) There's nothing "out there" at all,
absolutely everything is absolutely nothing. "There's no form, no feelings, no
perceptions, no formations, no consciousness; no eyes, no ears, no
nose, no tongue, no body, no mind; no color, no sound, no smell, no
taste, no touch, nothing to examine. Nothing to be seen, nothing to
be thought, nothing to not-know and not even an end of not-knowing.
Nothing at all, until we become old and die, and we don't do that
either. There's no start, no path, no end, no achievements to seek
out. "Sophie: let go. Stop worrying.
Depend on what *is*. Let your mind take the day off, and you won't
need to fear anything. When you see things clearly, you'll know
you're already exactly where you need to be. "Sophie: you don't have to get it
-- you've got it. Let that sink in, and it'll all be ok. "Sophie, spread the word: let go,
get out there, wake up!" Added comment: "Gate, gate, para gate. Para
sam gate. Bodhi, svaha!" That's it -- the excellent,
supercalifragilisticexpialidocious mantra to which the drumbeat of
the heart sutra serves as preface. Translators generally leave gate...
as a phonetic transliteration of the original Sanskrit, because
mantras are believed to act without rational understanding, bypassing
little mind. Sounds a bit like magical thinking to
me. In fact, in his translation of the heart sutra, Edward Conze
presents the word "mantra" as "spell." Often, after not translating the
mantra, translators remind us that if they had translated it, it
would have come out something like this: "Beyond, beyond,
really beyond. All the way to the other shore. So be it! I acknowledge that this is different in
tone than "let go, get out there, wake up!" Still, I take the heart sutra as an
exhortation and encouragement towards seeking enlightenment, no
matter how contradictory this appears to be to the "nothing to
attain" spirit. That's why I'm comfortable with "let go...
wake up." Adding "get out there" seems to me to honor
the "beyond...to the other shore." If not "get out
there," I'd have been tempted to use "just do it,"
except for that phrase's having been co-opted by Nike, with the
resulting inevitable and unwanted connotations. One other point I should make, lest it
is not totally obvious. I am not a linguist, a scholar of Buddhism,
or even much of a Buddhist. Please don't take this too seriously. Triptych, Heart
Sutra
Lynda McDevitt Now when we chant the Heart Sutra
Barry Evans * Damn, this ice cream
tastes good. Too bad it's going to be over soon. * We spent so much on
getting here, shouldn't I be feeling happier than I am? * This feels so good. Wish
I'd done it before. * What a sunset! Almost as
good as yesterday's! * and etc. We are not built for
chronic happiness. Why not? Because, to a first approximation, our
brains evolved during the Pleistocene epoch. Here's the scenario, one
million BC: Bug, meanwhile, and the
rest of the tribe, are worried about where they should hunt so the
whole tribe (less Ug) can eat. And with the waterhole drying up,
where's the nearest water source? Anxiety is the order of the day.
But they do survive, and reproduce, and we're the result. We're not
designed to be content--we've got Bug's anxiety-prone genes. We worry
and we're unhappy because our genes tell us to be, because that's
what allowed our stone-age ancestors to survive and reproduce. All of which is a great
relief. What, me worry? Of course! I'm supposed to!
We spend at least half our lives in either physical or emotional
discomfort, yet we persist in believing that happiness is our natural,
normal condition and that when were not happy, we're not normal. --Geneen Roth edited by Michael Quam
In this second edition of “Dharma Gates Are Boundless,” we have three
items that reveal moments of dharma, even though they were not composed
with the
express purpose of doing so. For me, and I
suspect for some of my fellow American Buddhists, one of the more
difficult or obscure aspects of traditional Buddhist teaching has
been the concept of karma. One response to such a statement might be
that karma is just how the universe works and so, like gravity, it
doesn’t matter much if you understand it or not, it still happens.
Well, it may not matter much, but I still want to get some glimmer. During a six-year period, 1903-08, the
German poet Rainer Marie Rilke wrote a series of ten letters to Franz
Xaver Kappus, replying to the young man’s letters about the
difficulties of life and art. These letters were later translated by
M. D. Herter Norton and published in a small volume called Letters
to a Young Poet. In Letter Eight, Rilke responds to Kappus’s
account of some great “sadnesses” that have befallen him. The
whole letter is full of rich and deep reflection, but the following
portion contains that glimmer that I have been looking for: Were it possible for us to see
further than our knowledge reaches, and yet a little way beyond the
outworks of our divining, perhaps we would endure our sadnesses with
greater confidence than our joys. For they are the moments when
something new has entered into us, something unknown; our feelings
grow mute in shy perplexity, everything in us withdraws, a stillness
comes, and the new, which no one knows, stands in the midst of it and
is silent. I believe that almost all our
sadnesses are moments of tension that we find paralyzing because we
no longer hear our surprised feelings living. Because we are alone
with the alien thing that has entered into our self; because
everything intimate and accustomed is for an instant taken away;
because we stand in the middle of a transition where we cannot remain
standing. For this reason the sadness too passes: the new thing in
us, the added thing, has entered into our heart, has gone into its
inmost chamber and is not even there any more, is already in our
blood. And we do not learn what it was. We could easily be made to
believe that nothing has happened, and yet we have changed, as a
house changes into which a guest has entered. We cannot say who has
come, perhaps we shall never know, but many signs indicate that the
future enters into us in this way in order to transform itself in us
long before it happens. And this is why it is so important to be
lonely and attentive when one is sad: because the apparently
uneventful and stark moment at which our future sets foot in us is so
much closer to life than that other noisy and fortuitous point of
time at which it happens to us as if from outside. The more still,
more patient and more open we are when we are sad, so much the deeper
and so much the more unswervingly does the new go into us, so much
the better do we make it ours, so much the more will it be our
destiny, and when on some later day it “happens” (that is, steps
forth out of us to others), we shall feel in our inmost selves akin
and near to it. And that is necessary. It is necessary—and toward
this our development will move gradually—that nothing strange
should befall us, but only that which has long belonged to us. We
have already had to rethink so many of our concepts of motion, we
will also gradually learn to realize that that which we call destiny
goes forth from within people, not from without into them. [Letters to a Young Poet, Norton, 1954] The famous Tokyo detective looked as if
he’d taken a shower (in The Best American Poetry 1998;
originally from The New Republic)
Always remember that you’re unique.
Just like everyone else. In keeping with those last words of advice, I’ll close this column. Keep sending me items you think might fit this space.
Humboldt Buddhists call for withdrawal from Iraq Saying the Bush administration has failed “to provide a convincing
justification for the resulting tragedies” from the war in Iraq,
Humboldt County Buddhists are calling for the immediate withdrawal of
U.S. troops from Iraq. ”We, the members of the Humboldt
chapter of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship, believe that the U.S.
government should begin an immediate withdrawal of all U.S. troops from
Iraq,” the contingent said in an e-mail to the Times-Standard. The
e-mail said more than 2,300 U.S. soldiers have been killed in the
conflict and that according to the Iraq Body Count project
(www.iraqbodycount.org), “there have been more than 33,000 Iraqi
civilian deaths.” Mitch Trachtenberg, of the Humboldt
chapter of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship, said Humboldt County's share
of the war, which has cost the U.S. coffers more than $270 billion,
comes to more than $84 million (www.costofwar.com). ”The
amount spent on the war,” Trachtenberg said, is “enough to have ensured
that every child in the world would have been given basic immunizations
for the next 90 years.” ”Three years after invading Iraq,
the Bush administration has yet to provide a convincing justification
for the resulting tragedies,” Trachtenberg said. “We believe the Bush
administration's policies with regard to Iraq have been a moral and
practical disaster for our country and the world, and we join with
others in calling for immediate withdrawal from Iraq.”
(c) 2006
Times-Standard (Eureka, CA) April 11, 2006. All rights reserved.
Reproduced with the permission of Media NewsGroup, Inc. by NewsBank,
Inc. Record Number: 3697622 The Eureka Reporter had two articles on the
International Day in Solidarity with Victims of Torture, in which local
BPF members participated. The web article
("Groups hold vigil against torture tonight," by Rebecca S. Bender) is
still available on-line; it gives some background on the UN Convention
against Torture and includes quotes from an interview with sangha
member Catherine Cascade; the short print article ("Torture Vigil," by Tyson Ritter, July 2, 2006,
p. A7) included this picture:
No. 2 ~
2006
Table of Contents
The Americanization of Zen
What is
meant
by “Americanization”?
How does “Americanization” happen?
What elements of American culture contribute to the
welfare and
happiness of all sentient and non-sentient beings?
How does American pragmatism influence what we are and are
not
willing to “Americanize”?
Where does authority lie in American Soto Zen groups?
How do we make the natural world sacred once more?
Are kalyana mitrata (spiritual friendship) and the
Four Brahma Viharas (love, compassion, sympathetic joy, equanimity)
sufficient to include the various modes of love which touch everyone?
How does America’s commercialization of zen impact its
image on
our
dominant religion?
Has the presence of women as priests, teachers and heads of zen
centers changed other aspects of zen in America?
Should elements of Japanese Soto Zen not yet transferred
to
American
Soto Zen now be included?
(e.g. The Pacific World of 1994 has an
article on “Soto Zen and the Inari Cult” which claims there is an
“intimate, syncretistic relation between the Inari cult and the Soto
Zen sect.” The ubiquitous symbol of this cult is the fox, noticeably
absent from American Zen centers.)
Within the Arcata Zen Group, when Maylie Scott Roshi, was alive, she
dropped off some things. e.g. trimming the altar candle, continued
some things, e.g. Soto Zen style of eating oryoki, and
adapted forms to circumstances. When we did our annual Mountains and
Rivers sesshin, Maylie dropped off the formal oryoki and spontaneously
produced an esthetic but pragmatic form. She was also open to a lay
member’s suggestion that during the afternoon we do a long kinhin to
the beach and sit zazen with our backs to giant driftwood logs. She
drew the line, however, when one of her students suggested doing zazen
naked in the hot tub.
Commercialization and popularization of Zen
Zen is pervasive in pop culture. Zen is seen as serene,
quiet, peaceful and healthy, and is found on cereal boxes, news shows
and porn sites (yes there is a zenporn website).
In San Diego Bill found a listing for Zen Body Mind Sanctuary. When he
phoned to find what they do at this sanctuary he was told, “We do
facials and massage.”
When <Americanization zen> is Googled, over 1,000 sites arise.
American roots: Zen without human teachers
In American literature we find numerous examples of people who found
spontaneous way seeking mind, zen meditation and experiences in
nature. Henry Thoreau, John Muir, Aldo Leopold, John Steinbeck,
Robinson Jeffers and Rachel Carson (The Sea Around
Us) write with exquisite beauty about their zen experiences.
Peter Matthiessen writes explicitly of his journey into the Himalayas
in search of The Snow Leopard which became his metaphor for
way-seeking mind. He also wrote of his own journey over many decades
in the Nine-Headed Dragon River: Zen Journals
1969-1982. Prior to introduced knowledge some already
recognized that “insentient beings speak dharma.”
Falls of the Kaaterskill Thomas Cole,
1826
Feminism
When Soto Zen began its assent in mainstream culture
during 1950s it was expressed in the poetry of male Beat writers, e.g.
Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg. During the 1960s and onward,
feminists took up Soto Zen with a vengeance.
For example, when Gael and Bill did their work practice during sangha
week at Tassajara they worked in the library (we were put there by the
practice leader who did not trust us with shovels). There were so many
books on zen and feminism we ran out of time during work practice
trying to cross-reference all of them.
More and more zen study groups offer discussions of Chinese women
teachers as our advisor Alan Senauke did during a recent visit to Rin
Shin-ji.
More and more women are seeking zen priesthood. This is also true of
other religions in America, except of course for the Catholics. The
swarm of women seeking to become priests again reflects the
Americanization of zen, but whether their presence has significantly
changed practice is unclear.
Puritanism and Fundamentalism
These are two separate elements, but we have combined them
because of space limits in this essay.
Puritanism popularly refers to an attitude toward sex, but in
Christian history it meant simplification of dress and speech and most
importantly of ritual. The whole issue of ritual forms has been a
divisive one for the Arcata Zen Group, with some preferring
simplification (Americanization?) but others opting for adaptation of
Japanese Soto Zen forms. The latter dominate large zen centers in
northern California, e.g. San Francisco Zen Center; Berkeley Zen
Center; and Tassajara, a Soto Zen training monastery.
Fundamentalism is a recurring element in American religions. Some
students of religions in America describe fundamentalism as
solidification of form and doctrine flourishing especially during
eras of stress and great social change. Clinging to the literal
interpretation of the Bible, for example, is found in current American
Christianity. This is not to be confused with evangelical Christianity
which emphasizes self-help through Christ. In Soto Zen, fundamentalism
is manifest, for example, by insistence on reciting chants in
Japanese. In America it also includes antipathy toward eroticism and
discussion of sex. Sex is not discussed or if explicit sex is
discussed in the context of following the Precepts the underlying text
is that sex is “what those homosexuals do.” The problems of
heterosexuals at The San Francisco Zen Center and abbot Richard Baker
are discussed in the book Shoes Outside the Door.
At Tassajara Bill interviewed several young men on how they are
trained to deal with their sexual feelings. He was told that they are
instructed to “be cool.”
One young man said he was reading a book on trantric sex. Gael was
informed at Mt. Baldy Zen Center (Rinzai) that men and women used to
sit on opposite sides of the room because sexual feelings sometimes
arose during meditation. She was not informed on what to do with
those feelings should they arise.
Informality
Americans are noted for their informal behavior. This
includes, at some Soto Zen centers, attempts to blend into the larger
community. When Bill visited the Zen Center of San Diego, doing
research for this essay, he was told that Joko Beck insists that
priests do not wear robes and that members blend into the Pacific
Beach community where the Zen Center is located in an ordinary house.
At this same center, English is the exclusive language used. An
aesthetic stone is on the main altar; no Buddha or Bodhisattva figures
are present although there is one candle and one incense burner. The
service after the dhama talk consists of three bells, three full
prostrations, followed by two bells. 
Cathedral Rock, Yosemite Albert
Bierstadt 1870
American Soto Zen inherited the hierarchical form of
authority which dominates Japanese Buddhism in general. This
authoritarian and patriarchal structure was accepted while Japanese
masters headed American Zen Centers. However, as these teachers, e.g.
Shunryu Suzuki and Maezumi Roshi, died, more egalitarian forms of
governance emerged. At the Arcata Zen Center, since Maylie Scott
Roshi’s death, authority resides in the Practice Committee. This is a
non-elected, self-selected group which decides by consensus on matters
of practice, visiting teachers and ritual forms. (A Board of
Directors handles money and business matters.) While AZG has two
advisors and two Practice Leaders, the Practice Committee retains
final say. Mel Weitsman, abbot of Berkeley Zen Center and Maylie’s
root teacher, noted that Maylie did not appoint leaders during the
weeks she was dying. Mel’s thoughts are worth including. “One
problem here [AZG] is that Maylie did not sanction leaders. . .perhaps
because she did not have time in her illness. Katagiri gave
transmission to eight or nine people at his death, but appointed no
leaders, and the sangha fell apart in Minnesota” (taken from notes of
Mel’s remarks).
Individualism
Individualism is one of the hallmarks of American values. It is
reflected in American self-help movements including the popularity of
combining yoga as exercise with zazen. Individualism probably pops up
most alarmingly in Practice Committees and other lay zen
administrative groups where inidividuality overcomes concern for the
sangha as a whole.
American progressive Soto Zen priests are fervid advocates
of social justice.
Science and Technology
Most Americans accept science and technology although polls show most
are disinclined to accept evolution. The most recent focus of
dialogue between Buddhism and science is in the area of Western
neuroscience. Last year The Johns Hopkins University School of
Medicine co-sponsored, with The Mind & Life Institute, a conference
whose title was “The Science and Clinical Applications of Meditation.”
The Dalai Lama was present together with specialists in neuroscience.
Zen and the Brain is a 900 page book reporting
research done on the effects of meditation (zen) on the brain (and
vice versa?).
Social Class and Race
The stratification of American society is continuing and
is a major aspect of people’s life, world and mind set. Who we
associate with, for example, is frequently conditioned by our education
and social class. A survey of Soto Zen members, discussed by James
Coleman in his book The New Buddhism: The Western
Transformation of an Ancient Tradition, found that members of
Soto Zen sanghas have much more cognitive education than average in
America. Over fifty percent of his sample had advanced degrees. He
also found that Buddhism appeals to Caucasians who are politically
left of center but not wealthy. In other words, we are overeducated
and generally underpaid advocates for progressive social reform (but
not revolutionary or anarchist). An interesting footnote reveals that
only 2.8 percent of his sample were self-identified Republicans.
Conclusion
Heart Song
While trying his hardest to make sense
of things, Amadeus realized how free and open everything really is,
and was finally able to relax.
~ Mitch Trachtenberg
In The Lineage of Good Company
read at Maylie Scott’s memorial
service, May 11,2006
we offer it to you, Maylie.
We’ve slipped you snugly between
the great Eihei Dogen
and
the great sage Manjushri
Bodhisattva.
If you had been present when that
decision was made
no doubt you would have skillfully
protested.
But what a right and proper place
for you in our lineage:
right after your beloved Dogen-
“Just let his words wash over you”
you told us
and so you sprinkled us with Dogen’s
dharma
till we were drenched with moonlit
dew….
and right before the bodhisattva of
wisdom,
Manjushri of the sword of
discrimination
like you who taught with clarity to
discern
the delusion in our thinking
the ranunculus among the flowers.
So now from your cozy position
would you invite us to join you
in the company of buddhas
or rather would you say,
“See where you are now”?
Skip the car!
Easy for Joan Tollifson to
say. For me, happiness is too elusive a target to "just be."
Note the Declaration doesn't say that our inalienable right is to be
happy, just to pursue it.
Good thing too. Like the
end of the rainbow (pot o' gold or not), happiness recedes as I chase
it. I don't usually quote Jiddu Krishnamurti (his personal morality
just being too out of whack with his teaching), but I find his
observation, "To have a cause for joy is no longer joy," to
be accurate. I'm happy until I notice I'm happy. And then?
And then one of several
things happens:
Ug wakes up, walks out of
the cave filled with joy--what a day! Goes down to the clearing and
sits, zoned out of his skull with utter contentment. Life just couldn't
be better. Bliss! And gets eaten by the passing sabertooth.
Dharma Gates Are Boundless: A Sangha Column
In this issue of Rin Shin-ji Voices, we begin a dialogue on the Americanization
of Zen. Living day-to-day in American culture, saturated as it is with
commercial entertainment, the cult of the celebrity, and the worship of
material success, can be challenging to someone following the Eightfold
Path. The following poem by Jonathan Aaron expresses that challenge and
a
moment of resolution.
Mr. Moto's Confession
in his linen suit and then slept in it.
He mopped his shiny forehead with a
handkerchief.
“Pascal was right,” he said, his
tenor slightly nasal.
“Men are so necessarily mad, that not
to be mad would amount to
another form of madness. What’s
more,” he added, the cat
eying the canary, “contradiction is
not a sign of falsity,
nor is the want of contradiction a sign
of truth—Pascal again.”
He took out his fountain pen. I saw my
chance.
Mr. Moto, I asked, should I believe all
those stories
I’ve heard about you? “Please do
not,” he murmured. “I do not.”
He was writing something on a cocktail
napkin.
“In fact,” he said, his pen
continuing to move, “my real name is
Laszlo Löwenstein. I was born in
Hungary, I drove myself crazy
as an actor in Zürich and Berlin,
and now that I live in Hollywood
I have bad dreams. Last night one of
them told me
I’ll end up buried alive in a tale by
Edgar Allan Poe.”
He coughed politely, capped his pen,
and getting to his feet
handed me the little piece of paper.
“An ancient Japanese
poetic form,” he said. Even as I
stared at it
the little cairn of characters, each a
tiny, exotic bird cage
with its doors open, blurred, melted,
and reformed as if rising
to the surface of a well, where these
words trembled
but stayed clear enough to read: As
evening nears, how clearly
a dog’s bark carries over the
water.
Mr. Moto's Dog
And finally, Karen Mueller shares with us several folk precepts that she received over the Internet:
If you tell the truth, you don’t have
to remember anything.
Some days you’re the bug; some days
you’re the windshield.
A closed mouth gathers no foot.
Humboldt Area Chapter/Buddhist Peace Fellowship: In the
News
from the Times Standard:
