Possibilities

Beneath the evening’s veil of hazy twilight

lies a world of contradictions,

yin and yang, in circling harmony,

constantly changing, rearranging

lives with hardly any notice.

It doesn’t take much to see it, only awareness,

awareness that anything is possible,

that there truly are blue birds with red breasts

and a yellow beak,

that fairies with small gossamer wings

dart from one flower to another,

replenishing each with sweet nectar

for the bees to make their honey,

for the hummingbirds to hum.

It’s not hard to see beneath the veil.

It only requires us to remember

the child within us when make-believe

was real, when truth be told was still relevant.

—Paul Causey

Stone Knows

stone

knows its place 

in dark, in sun

everywhere

still,

it lets things move

jackrabbit blurs

so fast, stone doesn't see him

men can join stone to stone

stack a wall, set a path

walls fall and paths tilt

but stone is willing

what does it matter 

this fleeting touch?

—Sarah Webb

Contemplation on Depth in Practice Reading

I love the description of Buddha fields in tonight’s reading, of each of us as the cultivator and cultivated, each as teacher and facilitator to the other.

I love the vision of Buddha fields that these reading holds, as both internal and external, as  both specific to one and at the same time expansive & indistinguishably interconnected with all buddha fields.

And how this reading is, as our practice is, a poetic reminder of the interwovenness of all things, all moments, all activity, be they our thoughts and actions or those happening around us.  And a further reminder of how the teachings, although limited by mere words, weave into our bodies, minds, and emotions, and soften our limited notions, much like a basket weaver softens grapevine and reshapes each part of the vine into a new creation with each part intersecting, overlapping, intertwined, and indiscernible as separate from all other parts. 

I so love how the teachings and our practice re-form us, much like the grapevine is reshaped, softening and inter-weaving us with the lives of others to co-create a life of less suffering for ourselves, for each other, for all.

—Nelda Adamson

It’s About the Journey

It’s about the journey, 

I get told, not the destination.

Three dogs later I wonder

which of the dogs is walking with me

and if it’s not about the destination

why do we have to climb up that hill

and not just sit and look into the valley?

My dog —Rex or Happy or Maggie—

pants beside me.

The smell of blackberries heating

in the sun on the bushes below

wafts up to us. Even I, 

with a twenty-thousandth of the olfactory power

of my doggy companion,

know that sweet-sour tang

that belongs only to blackberry.

Rex gets up, stiff legged, and looks at me.

All right, I say, let’s get some,

and we climb down.

Happy always loved blackberries.

He would cock his head

and eat them oh-so-carefully off the vine.

No thorns that way, Rex says. 

We wander on, 

full of the taste of blackberry.

—Sarah Webb