The Path
by
Silent Temple
Published by Silent Temple at Smashwords
Registered Copyright 2011 by Silent Temple.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission from the publisher except in the case of brief quotations. Email inquiry information can be obtained at Silent Temple website or simply post to Silent Temple, 5864 N Camino Esplendora, Tucson, AZ 85718.
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
This ebook is licensed for personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this ebook with another person, please purchase an additional copy for the recipient. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
A special thank you to Tarja Juvonen of Egina, OY, Helsinki, Finland, for allowing the publication of some poems originally found in the book Poems and Nonpoems for Tarja: Songs of Suomi, also by Silent Temple, for which Egina holds publishing rights.
Artwork and cover design by Silent Temple
Dedication
This book of poems I do dedicate to:
Eveleen Forkin, a sister in spirit, a divine hand of help, a living benediction, and a good potato farmer to boot. May the fields always be with her!
and
Aira Miettinen, a gifted master of spirit, a rare Oracle, an angel made flesh, and flesh made an angel.
Preface
The following poems are icons of an unorthodox spiritual journey spanning nearly 15 years of my life. The journey began in 1997. It was then that I literally jumped into the proverbial Abyss, and began a rigorous meditative and contemplative practice. About five years later, a wonderful Bodhisattva, Sr. Eveleen Forkin of the Marist Sisters, financed an art studio and meditation hall for me to build, providing affirmation I had never known and setting into motion a unique spiritual and creative path out of which I developed a form of neoZen called Silent Temple. However, in 2007 I stopped painting, having reached that barrier that so many unrecognized artists do, but continued on my spiritual journey, leading meditations, giving spiritual talks, further developing Silent Temple, and progressively entering into a life of vowed poverty and service to others. During 2009 and 2010 I lived in Vihti, Finland (Suomi) where I carried on my meditative life and continued writing poetry and neoZen talks, thanks to Tarja Stegars of Finland, a gifted plastic surgeon and painter. I also began painting again. Poems and paintings related to my stay in Finland are found in the section titled Selected Poetry from Poems and Nonpoems for Tarja: Songs of Suomi.
This book is divided into three Sections. The first section, The Stream of Awareness, consists of poems indicative of my spiritual experiences and progressions over the last 15 years. All poems in this section are presented in chronological order but are not dated. The second section, Selected Poetry from Poems and Nonpoems for Tarja: Songs of Suomi, marks a period of intense solitude in the Finnish countryside. This section is divided into the four seasons in honor of the traditional oriental format for nature poetry. The third section, Miscellaneous, exists merely as a demarcation between my stay in Finland and my present state of being shortly after leaving Finland, having been separated from a Europe of my belonging and love.
My life has been, is, and shall be to the core spiritual. Being dichotomously both free spirit and secular monk, I am nevertheless always inclined towards and relating from the Heart. Witnessing this miracle, it is known to me as wind, rain, snow, cloud, sun, and dandelions. All that is ordinary is creation’s first and last breath. I do so adore this reality and I am so very privileged to walk this earth with you. Let us all, everyone, write our stories, one to the other, and incline our hearts to hear the first and the last words of creation.
Silent Temple
Section1 - The Stream of Awareness
Section2 - Selected Poetry from Poems and Nonpoems for Tarja: Songs of Suomi
Section3 - Miscellaneous
The Stream of Awareness
~~~
Holding fast to mother’s frozen breasts,
All autumn’s blushing hid by time’s white kiss,
And feinting death to wind’s lifeless envy
Like holy bones in windswept caves,
It is the winter tree.
Heavy are its tears these barren times,
All crystalline gleaming gems upon some frozen pyre,
Untouched by flame or eulogy
‘Till at last spring yields a living bosom.
It is hope that plays the trick on death,
Sleeping within the winter’s cold light,
To wake again a springtime day.
~~~
Diverse worlds opposed to nature love not.
Tyrants sit upon armchairs and thrones alike
While angels pace the earth
With tattered wings and shabby coats,
Unaware of their poverty.
Heaven is heaven’s and earth is earth’s.
Great is uncertainty within the mind,
But not a care is there when Spirit enters the heart.
All are eternal that know it,
And not knowing, forgiven.
The Spirit is in emptiness and heaven’s dance with all;
Seen and not,
Substantial and not,
A lovemaking and a maker of love.
Our time here is sparse and well ride of evil.
The Heart is our beatitude.
I shall make some tea for jam and bread,
And take my Communion.
Lucky am I to be alive with the angels,
Feeling the sun’s light
And the coolness of the moon’s
Breaking through the window.
~~~
In embracing us,
Such objects arise as two
Making division.
~~~
Having nothing mine
What heart cannot see me here
Having nothing its own?
~~~
How shall you lose the stars
When turning to dust
Your robes become the stuff of creation?
~~~
Clear sky and clear mind,
Since when are there conditions
To obstruct the Way?
~~~
How to become?
No how!
Why to become?
No why!
Where to become?
No where!
When to become?
No when!
~~~
Form and emptiness are.
Still, I am, not of self but change,
Becoming ever more kind
As vehicle to good destiny
And wondrous realization.
Flowers bloom, snow falls,
And streams and lakes flow
As wind makes move the trees
And sunswept clouds.
Since when have I been an abiding self?
Since when am I a name?
~~~
For us to be our Natures,
We simply breathe in and out.
Decentralizing the mind,
Ten thousand demons fly away,
Unwelcomed inhabitants of our past.
Doing nothing, simply breathing,
We are free and perfect.
Striving not, sensing the breath,
We shower the world in vast and endless Love.
A single look can heal the sick
If kindness be its heart,
And a single heart can stir the eyes to see what is real,
Mystery and Love.
Doing, there is timeless stillness deep within;
Not doing, countless worlds stir
To that which is Holy and unmoved,
Our Buddha nature.
~~~
Heavy winter snow
Shoveling zendo pathways
A nearby train sounds
~~~
Every day, someone we love is hanging on a cross.
Please, don’t leave!
Please, look up!
~~~
We give rules to children and animals
But as for women and men,
Only the Heart is needed.
War is born of the rulemind
But Love be of the heartmind
That forsakes all war and every cruelty.
Countless wonders have been needlessly destroyed,
And but a few take all,
And continue their cacophony of rules and regulations.
The earth was made undivided.
Only those opposed to its maker
Divide.
Curse not the light;
Love the darkness;
And divide no more.
~~~
Rain comes, making our days sweet,
And even when filled with sorrow,
New beginnings arise.
All zendo roofs meet raindrops,
Shelter the meditative,
And when sounded, awaken with sweet music.
Here, every moment is heaven,
Eternity being found in a raindrop.
Come, rest with me in Dharma’s rain.
~~~
Walking to my death,
Now is the time to
Dance.
~~~
Tomorrow,
Painting ceilings and walls.
Amazing!
~~~
Arriving at the mountaintop, I did not see it;
Approaching, I did not know it;
Seeking, I did not find it
For it was here
Deep inside
Before
My
First
Breath.
~~~
This vast estate,
How shall you rest your coffin in it?
~~~
There is solitude even in the city.
I move about unnoticed and not mattering.
I am one with birds, squirrels, and Buddhabugs.
Without status, rank, or power,
I am unseen freedom.
Residing within the shadows,
I am sublime emptiness.
Feeling the source,
Bliss
Grabs
Me
Hard!
~~~
Rubbing together,
We become smooth and polished
Stone beings
Of
Love
~~~
Having no ideas,
Still there are ideas.
Both self and nonself
Realized,
Hand-in-hand,
They are one nonthing,
Nonapprehendable being and nonbeing
This ordinary I does witness as nonI.
There is no original face,
Only seeing.
A simple recluse I am,
Within a modest meditation space,
Waiting for a moment to be kind.
Come in!
Come in!
~~~
Oh snoring Buddha
What poem can I now make
From shaking lotus?
~~~
Mom and dad, burned to ash, emptying you into Swan Creek,
Lotus pattern upon lotus pattern fizzing,
Both becoming one with dad’s birthdance
Where once birds blackened the sun
And fish hid sandy bottoms.
Waiting years to free you, both held in Narcissist’s hands,
At last you came me, at last!
No poetry to be heard, no song, no dance;
Still, the reeds were,
And clouds, hiding the sun,
Were poised to weep at your departures.
Downstream, a nuclear power plant.
How did that get there?
I could not erase it for you.
I saw my childhood home.
You were not there.
I was not there.
Sister was not there.
Transience entered my heartmind.
Why cannot I resurrect you?
Rebirthed, shall you still not care for me
Or being so many non-things,
Shall you have no mind
Unconscious that I am
And unconscious you were?
Thank you for this life, mom and dad,
Even though you chose me not.
I meditated today as you
In perfect marriage
Upon a wooden deck
Fashioned by both your hands
After your deaths.
The sun shown upon you,
And incense entered your nostrils
As your legs grew numb,
Legs of the dead.
And I traveled with you as you
As stream and sediment
To Lake Erie,
And a row boat beckoned to you
As on your wedding day,
Dad’s legs growing blistered from sun,
Rowing his bride to heaven.
~~~
In the distance, unknown birds sing.
They are without name,
Nor can I recall my own.
~~~
Life is to be enjoyed, to bring a smile
Inside.
Pondering the great complexities will get you nowhere,
But laughing can move an entire forest to joy.
Don’t underestimate the heart.
It is the atom’s centre and every child’s lifeforce.
It is the stuff of the noble and wise,
And creation magic dust.
The lifetakers come, and swings become objects of regard,
And great imaginings no longer discovered.
Defy the livingdeath and do your best to laugh and be.
Rejoice!
Open heaven’s door on earth.
Take a swing in hand, and fly to the angels’ shouts of Beatitude!
Make this life thine own!
~~
What is best is easy.
I hear Jesus cleaning the water closet,
Buddha riding dressage,
And Lao Tzu singing in the opera.
Really!
Walk effortlessly, and you are a buddha.
Eat well, and you are a sutra.
Enjoy the fresh air, and you are an Arjuna.
It
Is
Just
Like
That!
~~~
Art is gone within me.
I feel a dangling skin before a psychopathic judge.
Shall I then be stretched taut,
A blank canvas with shroud’s eyes?
May I sing for you?
A shanty perhaps?
Something of the sea?
You in your desert realm,
An ocean is far beneath you,
Entrenched and reseeding.
What boat can you launch to reach the far shore?
Pie Jesu plays on a CD player.
Many versions come.
Christ is known Christless,
A holy being crucified
Needlessly.
Sitting today no mind,
I am Rest.
Just listening,
“Pie Jesu.”
Buddha is bereft of music,
An unpainted skin, blank and vacant.
Sing to me, Buddha!
Sing a shanty!
I cannot reconcile East and West.
Shall I then twist and turn?
My heart has grown large.
It protrudes out my chest,
Aching,
Consuming me,
Dancing in the cosmos,
Consigned to the Abyss.
Gone, gone, gone,
Beyond, beyond, beyond
Suchness.
~~~
To calm the mind,
Face the wall,
And release.
~~~
Dharma snow falling
Since when have I seen your face
Far away from me?
~~~
You are ten thousand nonthings
Breathing on the zendo’s glass
~~~
Breathing, I cannot stop breathing;
Erring, I cannot stop erring;
Giving, I cannot stop giving;
Seeing, I cannot stop seeing;
Loving, I cannot stop loving.
~~~
I hear my footsteps within the morning darkness.
The immortals walk with me:
One sound; one silence;
Just getting to be.
It is enough.
~~~
Since when have I been,
Coming and going nowhere,
Sleeping on a mat?
~~~
If you ask me where I am from, no telling!
I have lived many lives
But those are other selves
For other questions.
~~~
Ahead,
A rope-bridge
Leading to the ancestors,
Beautifully woven,
Swaying above the Abyss.
~~~
Being you is just being you
Like falling backwards into bed
Or shower singing
When the nearest person is at least a solar system away.
It is you far from the maddening crowd
Of cruel expectations.
Just being you is
YOU!
~~~
Cold air is in the zendo
Making clouds from lips.
~~~
Not too much balance.
Even the earth wobbles,
Making spinning tops look small.
~~~
You are looking at me from a great distance,
And I just want you completely.
You know, it all ends so abruptly
Like sparklers.
So, let’s throw it all away,
Even this thing we call a self,
And take this life before it stops.
Take it,
Take it all,
And walk ‘round all the living dead
Because the joke’s on us
If we buy all that crap
As
Things
Go
Fizzzzzz.
~~~
No in;
No out.
~~~
Writing, having no ideas,
How is it words come so nicely?
The best of me is not me!
~~~
The atmosphere today is pure,
A day from my childhood resurrected
With smeared cool shadows
Amidst luminous beings,
Leaves moving, nearly awakening the Great Trees,
And a distant barking dog,
A certain friend.
~~~
Two zendo skylights
High within the vaulted ceiling,
Making incense swept shafts of light,
Opened windows leading to cedar arbors
And fir trellises
Draped with ivy,
The sound of young birds,
And the sight of a stone bodhisattva
Sitting silently
Without
A
Care.
~~~
In my hermitage
More walls are needed to hide
The silence within.
~~~
Inside my friend Bernie’s dying eyes,
A vacant room
With curtains moving sensuously in the wind.
No more Chopin etudes to be played, Bernie.
You are gone,
And the world is impoverished
Once
Again.
~~~
Remembering performing on stage
At the cross roads between self and other
Becoming one,
The self left behind.
~~~
I see a car through a zendo window,
An old station wagon, green-blue,
Owned by the old guy next door
Who died hating me,
Always mumbling profanities and obscenities
For my daily reading.
Noise,
Static,
Cacophony
For
The
Demons.
He descended,
And his daughter arose.
She, a sweet violin
And her boyfriend, a rich cello.
And there is gray paint on the violin’s garage,
And a great tree’s shadow upon it,
And the sun’s light upon it, too.
Beatitude.
Things change.
One day there is an ogre, and the next,
A nice violin and cello.
~~~
Upon which ladder rung do you cling
With aching feet and clutching hands,
Breaking a smile upon trembling lips?
~~~
Being woman, if you should be,
There is none like you
Except universe itself,
Forever enduring,
Forever opening
To life and love.
~~~
Being man, if you should be,
There is none like you,
And being universe itself,
Forever you defy your end
As you rush to it.
~~~
Mechanics does play its part,
A bad actor in a play of Love,
Slow of speech,
Ponderous,
And without a sense of timing,
Diminishing both comedy and tragedy
With its semantics devoid of line and art.
~~~
I have no idea who I am
But do find myself being this or that.
~~~
All is a two sided coin, both heads and tails
But somehow unfairly weighted,
The stuff of markets and minds
With attached small eyes,
Thespians devoid of heart and art,
Making the world come to its end
Before its time
As a dull whimper.
~~~
And hearing that sound again,
That metallic clash of countless electrons,
The great friction of many small things,
The wearing down of humankind’s vain distractions,
I too feel artless but without coin or purse.
~~~
Here, Silent Temple with ancient Buddha script in hand
Knows no noise this day
~~~
Just sitting,
Cool breeze,
Warm hands,
Mottled gray skies,
And sound of breath.
No attainment,
No nonattainment.
No coming,
No going.
No this,
No that.
Just
Awareness.
~~~
The sun is rising.
I hear footsteps on the gray stone pathway
Leading to the zendo.
Countless birds sing within the morning trees.
I was not,
I am not,
I shall not be.
Only
This
Remains.
~~~
If you are looking for what you want to hear,
A master is on every block.
~~~
This cosmic display,
It’s you.
Hold the cup within your hands and drink;
Take of it
And
Do
No
Harm.
~~~
To not be seen.
Just the running of the mind
Across paper.
Now
The
Truth!
~~~
I cannot take the straight path
But rather the one winding
With unknowns beyond every meander
And Emptiness beckoning the heartmind.
This life is not a grid for me of mapped conveniences
But a prayer to Mystery and kindly regard
Within this moment and none other
As the eternal heart opening to it all.
~~~
Slept like Rip Van Winkle.
Arising, felt like the first man
Then sickness and aches rolled in
With
A
Benediction.
~~~
Early morning darkness,
Walking to Silent Temple Zendo,
Snow illuminating the path
With wondrous
Silence
~~~
Eternity has an end,
Spun in the mind
And unraveled at death.
~~~
I know a writer of powerful term papers,
Integral and ever knowing,
But in tome after tome, he keeps saying the same things,
The thoughts of others.
Why not just sell a book at most
Or better still reduce it all to a long run on sentence?
~~~
No likeness;
No mirror;
No seeing;
Not
One
Thing.
~~~
Losing everything is of little concern
When the self is shed.
No one to cling to;
No things to clutch.
Just becoming the birds songs
High in the pines;
Just letting it be,
Much is attained.
~~~
Again, the zendo,
Here,
Right now,
Breaking rules,
Making nice poems.
~~~
Finding the breath,
Thoughts of ruin are dispelled.
Inclined towards death,
I am awake.
~~~
Placing their ashes in Swan Creek,
Fizzing lotus patterns formed
Moving to the sandy bottom
Or becoming suspended in the waters,
Flowing to Lake Erie
Never to be found again.
~~~
My mother threw me out all day long,
Spring, summer, fall, and winter.
I know many ices,
Crows flying,
Cows in the distance,
Barbed wire,
And wind music
Sublime.
~~~
I lived with them
Now ashes,
Save for a sister
Somewhere
Without a care for me.
~~~
Emptiness in my heart,
Wet or frozen feet,
Mud always on my knees,
A wolf child
Pushed out of a cage.
Still wolf.
Still wild.
Vast emptiness.
Vast animal civility.
Vast leave it aloneness.
Just watching.
Just feeling
Everything.
~~~
Gathering old dogs,
Saving this one from his self,
Just sitting zazen.
~~~
Early morning zendo
Cold winter’s wind
Insubstantial being
~~~
Everything my father made was sacred;
Sacred hands upon sacred wood.
But having cast his ashes into the waters,
I cannot find him
Though I call his name.
Gone beyond,
Gone beyond the beyond,
Perfectly made!
~~~
Rules and measures never say anything in the end
Except perhaps enlightenment approaches
98.6 degrees Fahrenheit.
~~~
Sitting,
Facing the wall,
Emptiness.
Within, without;
Without, within
But no in
And no out.
Just
Being
This.
~~~
Throwing poems to the wind,
Mind carries them far!
~~~
Sitting zazen,
Snow piled white,
Night sky inky black,
The moon sits in a barren tree
Glimmering ice.
~~~
Snowflakes fall and are forgotten,
Never having been known,
Just like you and me.
Why hold to foolish ideas?
Just be the unknown.
Change form.
Never die.
~~~
Just make it pure
Because there’s nothing left to do
As possibility.
~~~
Just to be now!
Just to be doing this!
~~~
Jesus is not here.
Mohammed is not here.
Moses is not here.
Rumi is not here.
Buddha is not here.
God is not here.
Only
You
And
I
Are
Here.
~~~
Sitting; facing the wall.
Wall looks back and blinks
Once.
~~~
After darkness enters
I cannot recall day’s end
Nor the sun’s birth
~~~
Whether strong or weakly hewn of limb,
Whether fine or grossly rendered of mind,
Let us meet in security,
Eye to eye,
Hand to hand,
Heart to heart
Upon this, this Table insubstantial.
Let the singers sing their songs,
Let the dancers mark their time and space,
And be one with Merlin
As Merlin is one with stone and tree and deer afield
And wolves and great bear
And black earth and granite stepping into the sea.
One, yes one spiritual family.
Gone be unnecessary suffering;
Gone be needless loneliness;
And gone be those who do not see you in heaven’s light,
All rosy gold with vaulted blue sky.
The Time is at hand;
You be near my Heart;
The cock crows the New, the Deathless.
Come.
~~~
Sitting,
The mind calm,
Emptiness arises,
Painting sky and trees,
Walls and ceilings,
Floors and rocks
Sunlight gold.