it is not something you can attain by embellishment
The Canon is still full of old paper
seventeen-hundred tangled vines
who can see through the mess
one thought is still too many
Red Pine’s “The Zen Works of Stonehouse”
Posts Tagged → mastery
when young there was a girl
lucien stryk on shinkichi takahashi
I hold a newspaper, reading.
Suddenly my hands become cow ears,
Then turn into Pusan, the South Korean port.
Lying on a mat
Spread on the bankside stones,
I fell asleep.
But a willow leaf, breeze-stirred,
Brushed my ear.
I remained just as I was,
Near the murmurous water.
When young there was a girl
Who became a fish for me.
Whenever I wanted fish
Broiled in salt, I’d summon her.
She’d get down on her stomach
To be sun-cooked on the stones.
And she was always ready!
Alas, she no longer comes to me.
An old benighted drake,
I hobble homeward.
But look, my drake feet become horse hoofs!
Now they drop off
And, stretching marvelously,
Become the tracks of the Tokaido Railway Line.
recognizing a teacher
Every instance
of recognizing a teacher
is an authorization of spiritual power.
The most important one of these, and the only
absolutely necessary one on the way to
complete realization, is recognizing
yourself as your own
teacher.
You
can now buy
Wei wu Wei Ching as part of a
five-app bundle of Taoist classics
for iPhone or iPad for less than
the cost of one hardcover
book.
many try to usurp the style of zen
Nowadays many have
lost the old way, and many try to
usurp the style of zen, setting up their
own sects, keeping to cliches, and concocting
standardized formulas and slogans. Since they
themselves are not out of the rut, when they try
to help other people, it is like a rat going into
a hollow horn that grows narrower
and narrower until the rat is
trapped in a total
impasse.
let it go in all directions
When you hold on to something,
don’t let the smallest hair show. When you let go of
something, let it go in all directions. Meeting in heavy mist,
we turn out to be at the top of a thousand peaks.
Starting at the top of a thousand peaks we
turn out to be in heavy mist.
Today I am at Fuyuan Temple
inaugurating this hall and preaching the Dharma.
Yesterday I was outside my hut at Sky Lake ploughing in the clouds.
Thus it is said that the Dharma has no fixed shape but adapts to conditions.
It stirs the wind of perfect stillness and makes effortless
transformation possible. But at this moment,
what is it like?
Only after ninety thousand
miles does the P’eng unfold its wings.
Only after a thousand miles does
the crane take flight.
Red Pine’s “The Zen Works of Stonehouse”