supply chain (poem 021-2021)

We supply the want

Who the chains?

And who the need

Most unchained?

Supply chain disruptions

Meaning heart attacks?

Meditation mantras?

Falling in love

Or out of

Fasting or slowing

Tugging or pulling

Most of all

Waiting

To

Wait

Let

Wait

Go

you talkin' to me?

pardon me
you heard me
no, really, I didn't
I said, "to be or not to be"
that's what I thought
so you did hear me
point taken
I'll say it again
I dare you
"to be or not to be"
let's face it, that's pretty fuckn grandiose
how
c'mon
it ain't grandiose, it's basic
like "back to basics"
I've never understood what that meant
it's elemental, fundamental, mental, unsentimental
now you sound like early Dylan
nothing wrong with that
it's alright, ma
elementary, my dear Watson
he never said that
not exactly
anyway, where were we
right here
right here is where we always are
nowhere, man
now here
clever
slow down, you better slow down
break it down
when you said, "to be or not to be" were you serious
of course I was
serious as in suicidal
what, where do you get that
well, you're standing alone all serious and shit
it's a fecking play, I'm a character, on a stage
all the world's a stage
bingo
the play's the thing
how 'bout "play's the thing"
as in juggling, like the king's Fool
not that kind of juggling, more like thi
jousting
joisting
James Joyceting
ca-ching
bada-bing
to be
or
not to be
sproing
back to Square One
exactly
approximately
approximately King Hamlet
that's rich, even royal
royal manna
give that man a cigar
he she it them
that, too
 

PC: post-coronavirus

Me: Hey, Alfredo, you know what? Things just aren't going to be the same after this. They're really not going to be the same.

Alfredo: They never are.

And here I was the one pretending to be a Buddhist.
 

letting go vs. holding on

A friend recently introduced me to the saying "let go or be dragged." (Or was it the variant "let go or get dragged"?) It is said to be a Zen proverb, but who can say for sure what the origin is for these slogans. And the origin doesn't much matter to me. For the record, I don't recall reading "Letting Go" by Philip Roth. However, I did read "Letting Go of the Words" by Ginny Redish, and it helped me immensely in writing web content. 

Letting go.

It evokes the question, "Letting go means letting go of what?" Without much forethought, this parade of notions involving "letting go" marches before me: life, death, love, hate, attachment, detachment, fear, expectation, attainment, nonattainment, and notions themselves.

Being dragged.

What question does "being dragged" elicit?  The smart-aleck, rice-bowl-upside-the-head answer would have me repeat verbatim the list italicized above. I don't know; help me out. I guess being dragged translates to holding on, possessing, owning, expecting, anticipating, projecting, reimagining, rehearsing, past, future, notions. 

Being dragged conveys the suffering of not letting go.

Is this mike working? I feel like a comedian who is bombing. (But that's because I am being dragged by preconceived notions I have not let go of.)

I am on the verge of deleting this post or shuttling it off to a bin labeled "draft."

Words, words, words.


“If you let go a little, you will have a little peace. If you let go a lot, you will have a lot of peace.” ~Ajahn Chah

the address of happiness

I am paraphrasing Thich Nhat Hanh here, who is paraphrasing the Buddha:

The address of happiness, the address of life, is -- wait for it --

HERE AND NOW.

No postage required, no return address needed, no addressee needed either, for that matter.

Pretty simple, eh?

So, see you at the corner of Here and Now Streets.

the time of day

It is Sunday morning. I thought of going to church, even wanted to, but staying up so late last night (in the wee hours) now leaves me so tired, after breakfast, that I am toying with the idea of crawling back to bed. It is an idea I hope and pray I resist. Is that depression? The whole feeling has echoes of the days of Sunday morning coming down, with hangovers both physical and existential, now 35 years ago, thank God, but still there for me if I succumb to it. I hear the sparrows and robins. The meteorological conditions seems pleasant. I don't know if any of those factors will be enough to rouse me. Morning is not my time of day anyway. Give me evening, its vespers charms of setting sun, chirping robins, and something something something. Yesterday I browsed two bookstores for a copy of the Book of Common Prayer. Here at home I have one, taken from an Episcopal church more than 15 years ago. Maybe they gave it to me. I guess I'm still a member there but have always wrestled with its suburbanness. I've been thinking of secretly returning it one Sunday, placing it in the pew holder. Why? I guess to allow me to float somewhere else, or because of a secret guilt over stealing that book. Which is nonsense, of course. Maybe I need a book of uncommon prayer. I already have those. In the morning -- usually mornings -- I read from a compilation of writings by Thich Nhat Hank and also, these days, The Untethered Soul by Michael A. Singer. The latter was given to me last year as a birthday or Christmas present. My tea has gotten lukewarm, not warm at all.

Naming the Cows

Continuing with yesterday's post on the Releasing Our Cows theme, I would like to note that Thich Nhat Hanh goes on to say,

"One practice we can do is to take a piece of paper and write down the names of our cows. Then we can look deeply to see whether we're capable of releasing some of them. We may have thought these things were crucial to our well-being, but if we look deeply, we may realize that they are the obstacles to our true joy and happiness."

I cannot do this.

Yet.

But I can pray for the willingness to be willing.

I know what some of the cows' names are (you share some of those traditional, "civilized," "normal" cow names, the hallmarks of sanity, probity, and stability, don't you?).

Notice that we are asked to see if we can release "some" of these cows of attachment. Not "all."

I know, might as well start somewhere.

As in here.

And now.

Moo.

Moo.

till the cows come home, or don't

Today is the 79th day of the year.

Meditation Number 79 in Your True Home: the everyday wisdom of Thich Nhat Hanh is titled "Releasing Our Cows." It relates a story of the Buddha. A farmer comes upon the Buddha and his followers sitting in the forest. The peasant inquires about some cows he has lost. The farmer is distressed. He can't find his cows.

"When the farmer had gone, the Buddha turned to his monks, smiled, and said, 'Dear friends, you should be veryhappy. You don't have any cows to lose.' "

This struck me. I struggle with this. As a matter of fact, I am missing some cherished items. I lost them a few weeks ago. I value them. It was (is?) driving me crazy. I've inquired at places where I had been, even though I know I neurotically check for my belongings upon leaving, say, a coffee shop. I've searched pockets and notebooks and my car and nooks and crannies and pants and shirts and coats and jackets and sheets and floors and bureaus and desks and bathrobe and pajamas and drawers and street and sidewalks and pockets and pockets and tables and chairs over and over and over again, and then did it again.

I can't find them.

I've lost my cows.

And this does not even talk about my real "cows."

 

ashes dust zen et cetera

Is there any day more than Ash Wednesday that Buddhism and Christianity are closer in medium and message?

Christians receive ashes, as a sign of mortality and repentance. As for the mortality aspect, is it not akin to the impermanence that Zen Buddhists practice?

Various Christian denominations impose ashes on the forehead with these words spoken, or some variation of them, from Genesis 3:19:

Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

And then many walk around the rest of the day with ashes on the forehead, sometimes in the shape of a cross.

For me, it typically raises a quandary: wash them off or not? In other words, am I "bragging" about some sort of piety that I do not possess? Jesus warned against such strutting. But eventually the ashes need to get washed off, lest one's pillow become all ashy.

Is this a bleak day, a somber reminder of our mortality? I posit it should not be. I further suggest that Buddhists among us (sometimes I strut and pretend I am one, though "practice" is the only membership card, is it not?) would smile. They would not have to say anything.

A mindful Ash Wednesday (or Ash Monday, Ash Tuesday, Ash Thursday, Ash Friday, Ash Saturday, or Ash Sunday) would be occasion enough to smile.

rain

Rain. Its delicious, seductive tap on my roof and my windows. Amend that. My? I rent a space in a former garage, barely joined to a house, a place becoming increasingly crowded physically and metaphysically. Not mine. (What is mine? Or yours? Or anybody's?) I must be leaving these premises. Hence, "my" apartment search. The baseboard heating now and again makes pounding sounds. I always liked the Beatles song saluting the rain. Your rain, my rain, the rain. Speaking of yesterday's topic of aimlessness, the rain (in Spain, or elsewhere) has no aim, does it, save downward, sometimes aslant, but ever downward, into the ground or into a drain or a river or a lake and a tiny bit back up again into the sky, so not so downward there, but content with no other aim but rainness.

aimlessness, the virtue

My Thich Nhat Hanh meditation book speaks of the virtue of aimlessness. It cites the Sanskrit word apranihita. For me is aimlessness a virtue or a rationalization? I do not mind, either way. It is fine. No direction home. No direction away. No lost. No found. No aim. No lack of aim. All fine.

Besides, what would I be aiming at or aiming for?

I am reminded of Eugen Herrigel writing in Zen in the Art of Archery that a master archer could miss the target every time and still be a master archer.

Don't you just love what my mentor Sam Paterson used to call my love for "socks inside out"?

orange

Interrupting myself in the middle of my snarky comments to amiable barista Erin regarding GMO at Freedom of Espresso, my home base as an artisanal certified word roaster, I said, "See this orange?" I grabbed one of the oranges in a bowl on the counter. I re-interrupted myself, to add: "Did you hear about the terrible citrus blight in Florida?" Erin threw in something about GMOs and Nature and purity. I countered with something askew, about fighting "nature" by fighting polio. "I don't eat polio," Erin added. Then I re-re-interrupted myself to proclaim: "Speaking of eating. So, some Buddhists, like Thich Nhat Hanh, suggest eating one orange mindfully, and contemplating the air, rain, soil, everything." "And GMOs," she tossed in there, as if in a salad. All the while, a coffee-wanting or tea-desiring customer, a young man, hipsterish, as if I'd know, is listening and watching this. I try to give him my apportioned eye contact. "Shouldn't that be everything, not just an orange? A rugelach?" she asks. "Sure," I say. (At the coffee shop, the rugelach is such a standard and so good, I just ask for cinnamon "rugs" and they know.)

L'eau de lune

"I read the news today, oh boy . . . "

Actually, I didn't read the news; I heard it on NPR. (Who reads news anymore anyway? Sad.)

The news I refer to is that scientists studying stuff brought back decades ago from the Apollo missions have found molecules of water (water-bearing minerals, more accurately).

One scientist said, "This is not your grandmother's water." It's not oceans, or even puddles, or even liquid. Nor is it solid or gas. It is something else.

And surprising.

Surprising.

One scientist said she was so surprised she thought her instruments needed to be calibrated.

Water. We thought we knew you. We thought we understood intimately this building block of life. In our thirst for knowledge, we thought the word "water" in its infinite connotations and denotations quenched something. We were cocksure that, well (pun intended), water was at least wet, and close to solid in the frozen north, as solid as "meaning." But, alas, Water, we hardly knew you.

Water. Just a word, just a concept.

And how many other watery definitions will slosh down the drain of certainty as our world, our cosmos, rocks us with surprise?

How many other words turn out to be just like, um, water?

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
-- William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), "Hamlet," Act 1 scene 5