Laugh.
Laughter is immeasurable.
bring me the rhinoceros
One day
Yanguan called to his assistant,
“Bring me the rhinoceros fan.”The assistant said,
“It is broken.” Yanguan said, “In that case,
bring me the rhinoceros.”
Why,
sometimes I’ve believed
as many as six impossible things
before breakfast.
We sometimes think
of consciousness as a lamp, making
a golden cone of light on the surface of a desk.
Outside the yellow circle everything is dark and unknown.
The usual way of approaching things is to try to extend the yellow
circle into the darkness. Or perhaps to drag objects in from the dark.
That is working out of what you can conceive of, the bright area of what
you already know. This koan takes things the other way. Here you depend on
what is unknown and inconceivable to sustain you. Most of life is inconceivable;
even your left hand can’t be fully conceived of though it can be very useful.
And if you try hard to conceive of what your hand does, it won’t play
the piano very well. The inconceivable is the source of all that
comes into being. This koan is not about making what is
unknown, known. Instead it as exercise in relying on
and making friends with the inconceivable,
using a casual event to start an
exploration into the
unlit realms.
🍯
be conscious of who draws you
A sea-cow, a dugong, finds a special pearl
and brings it up on land at night. By the light it gives off
the dugong can graze on hyacinths and lilies.
The excrement of the dugong is precious ambergris
because it eats such beauty. Anyone who feeds on Majesty
becomes eloquent. The bee, from mystic inspiration,
fills its rooms with honey.
So the dugong grazes at night in the pearl-glow.
Presently, a merchant comes and drops black loam
over the pearl, then hides behind a tree to watch.
The dugong surges about the meadow like a blind bull.
Twenty times it rushes at nothing, passing the mound
where the pearl is.
So Satan couldn’t see
the spirit-center inside Adam.
God says, Descend,
and a huge pearl from Aden gets buried under dirt.
The merchant knows,
but the dugong doesn’t.
Every clay-pile with a pearl inside
loves to be near any other clay-pile with a pearl,
but those without pearls cannot stand to be near
the hidden companionship.
Remember the mouse on the riverbank?
There’s a love-string stretching into the water
hoping for the frog.
Suddenly a raven grips the mouse and flies off.
The frog too, from the riverbottom,
with one foot entangled in the invisible string,
follows, suspended in the air.
Amazed faces ask, “When did a raven ever go underwater and catch a frog?”
The frog answers, “This is the force of Friendship.”
What draws friends together
does not conform to Laws of Nature.
Form doesn’t know about spiritual closeness.
If a grain of barley approaches a grain of wheat,
an ant must be carrying it. A black ant on black felt.
You can’t see it, but if grains go toward each other,
it’s there.
A hand shifts our birdcages around.
Some are brought closer. Some move apart.
Do not try to reason it out. Be conscious
of who draws you and who not.
Gabriel was always there with Jesus, lifting him
above the dark-blue vault, the night-fortress world,
just as the raven of longing carries the flying frog.
the value of poverty
A certain man
was constantly bewailing his poverty.
Ibrahim ibn Adham said to him, “My son, perhaps
you paid little for your poverty.” “You are talking nonsense,”
said the man, “You should be ashamed of yourself.
Does anyone buy poverty?”
Ibrahim replied,
“For my part I chose it of my own free will;
moreover, I bought it at the price of this world’s sovereignty
and gave up my kingdom and my ruling over others. I would buy
one instant of this poverty again with a hundred worlds, for every moment
it becomes worth more to me. When I found this precious merchandise,
I gave my final farewells to royalty. Without any doubt I know
the value of poverty. While you remain in
ignorance of it, I give thanks
for it.
Ibrahim ibn Adham