i. oh silent day
We will all be released
when we embrace both the captive and the captor
and comfort them.
My friend Matthew says when you are in prison
you have to wash your clothing in the toilet
because if you send it to the laundry
you will never get it back.
and Heraklitus says
the way up is the way down
and Rumi says
there is up and down
and back and forth
and left and right
and yet there is only one direction
and that is the way of Eshgh.
oh silent day
oh when he washed
ii the holy land
the holy land is all around you
it is everywhere
above you inside you
the voices of your fathers
are not your voice
their horror too
this now can be silent
open your eyes o children of israel
it is time
surrender the ghost
iii Tree
Some seek truth by soaring the heights,
there where they would become one with the Boundless.
Others seek it plumbing the depths,
there where they would surrender and be Bounded.
And both of these ways are good for a time.
But the Boundless one soon becomes prisoner of his freedom
while the Bounded one in bondage knows little release.
Although I have somewhat preferred the second, I myself have tried both ways.
And I find myself thinking about the Sages of China.
They continually, patiently remind us
that there is no path and there is no way,
and that is both Path and Way.
We, they say. join heaven with earth.
But my roots still reach for the waters of the deep
while my leaves crave every fluctuation of the wind.
It is hard for me to embrace the paradox
that in contemplation of this very tension may lie peace.
Perhaps I am afraid to solve the koan.
So all I can do is continue to stand here
and trust that like a tree
I grow.
