For Shelter, the World

Paradox in action

A random chapter of the Tao Te Ching for this moment in time and space:

69

There is a saying amongst soldiers:
 I dare not make the first move but would rather play the guest;
 I dare not advance an inch but would rather withdraw a foot.

This is called marching without appearing to move,
Rolling up your sleeves without showing your arm,
Capturing the enemy without attacking,
Being armed without weapons.

There is no greater catastrophe than underestimating the enemy.
By underestimating the enemy, I almost lose what I value.

Therefore when the battle is joined,
The underdog will win.

-- version by Gia-Fu Feng and Jane English

 

The generals have a saying:
"Rather than make the first move
it is better to wait and see.
Rather than advance an inch
it is better to retreat a yard."

This is called
going forward without advancing,
pushing back without using weapons.

There is no greater misfortune
than underestimating your enemy.
Underestimating your enemy
means thinking that he is evil.
Thus you destroy your three treasures
and become an enemy yourself.

When two great forces oppose each other,
the victory will go
to the one that knows how to yield.

-- trans. by Stephen Mitchell

Making the leap

GLOUCESTER:

There is a cliff whose high and bending head
Looks fearfully in the confined deep:
Bring me but to the very brim of it,
And I'll repair the misery thou dost bear
With something rich about me: from that place
I shall no leading need.

-- King Lear, Act 4, Scene 1

Googling this phrase brings up an article from the UK newspaper "The Independent", written in 1993 on the occasion of Shakespeare's 429th birthday, which synopsizes the scene as follows:

Poor Tom, Gloucester's estranged son Edgar in disguise, leads his father part-way up the 'horrible steep', and convinces him that he stands on the brink ('The fishermen that walk upon the beach / Appear like mice'). Renouncing the world, and begging forgiveness from his son, the blind man throws himself forward to certain death. But Edgar has deceived him: Gloucester falls only on the grass. Returning in the guise of a local peasant, Edgar persuades his father that he has plummeted the height of 10 masts ('Thy life's a miracle'). The mental ordeal purges the old man of his despair. His imaginary fall restores us to solid ground.

And so it is.

A new world

Heal the World

There's a place in
Your heart
And I know that it is love
And this place could
Be much
Brighter than tomorrow
And if you really try
You'll find there's no need
To cry
In this place you'll feel
There's no hurt or sorrow

There are ways
To get there
If you care enough
For the living
Make a little space
Make a better place...

Heal the world
Make it a better place
For you and for me
And the entire human race
There are people dying
If you care enough
For the living
Make a better place
For you and for me

If you want to know why
There's a love that
Cannot lie
Love is strong
It only cares for
Joyful giving
If we try
We shall see
In this bliss
We cannot feel
Fear or dread
We stop existing and
Start living

Then it feels that always
Love's enough for
Us growing
So make a better world
Make a better world...

Heal the world
Make it a better place
For you and for me
And the entire human race
There are people dying
If you care enough
For the living
Make a better place
For you and for me

And the dream we were
Conceived in
Will reveal a joyful face
And the world we
Once believed in
Will shine again in grace
Then why do we keep
Strangling life
Wound this earth
Crucify its soul
Though its plain to see
This world is heavenly
Be god's glow

We could fly so high
Let our spirits never die
In my heart
I feel you are all
My brothers
Create a world with
No fear
Together we cry
Happy tears
See the nations turn
Their swords
Into plowshares

We could really get there
If you cared enough
For the living
Make a little space
To make a better place...

Heal the world
Make it a better place
For you and for me
And the entire human race
There are people dying
If you care enough
For the living
Make a better place
For you and for me


-- words and music, Michael Jackson (1958-2009)

namaste

Paradoxically, peace

For June, a random chapter of the Tao Te Ching, from "The Feminine Tao" website ...

35

The world is drawn to one
with understanding of the Tao.

The sage journeys in secure, safe, calm peace.

Initially, passersby may stop,
seeking food and music.

Then, from the lips of such a sage,
they will learn of the Tao.

Seeking to taste of it,
they will find no taste.

Seeking to see it,
they will find no sights.

Seeking to hear it,
they will find no sound.

For it is in using its teachings,
that one attains understanding
of its eternal value.

-- as translated by Holly Roberts

What reassuring words to read at a time when I've been sensing so much chaos and anxiety and upset in the world; when it's difficult to know what to believe and whom to trust, and when not much seems to make sense.

I remember the afternoon a week ago when I left Dallas, sitting in the airport waiting for my flight back to Portland and being amazed at how stirred up people seemed to be, in a way they hadn't been the previous weekend. They couldn't sit still, couldn't stop talking.

It's as if a fire had been lit underneath us, or as if we were zapped with a lightning bolt. (The astrologers among us will appreciate the Uranian reference there ... an influx of high-voltage energy, unexpected, unsettling, yet with gifts for us if we can make the choice to take advantage of them.)

I've been sleeping very well since I returned home, with dreams unlike what I'm used to, with lots of movement and people in them. Some of the dreams are unsettling, and yet they feel "right", with a somehow orderly flow to them, as if something's being adjusted or healed inside of me. Then I wake up feeling rested, yet at the same time panicky, sometimes with a feeling of impending doom. I tell myself, "just get up and start moving"; and once I do, I usually feel more empowered and grounded, although I'm aware of an underlying sense of heaviness and depression that's there most of the time.

I suspect it has to do with the fact that I'm on the verge of making a major leap, a quantum leap; and in fact, we are all doing so, individually and collectively. No wonder things feel stirred up. I think we're doing damned well with it, to be honest. Time for a little pat on the back, and definitely time for us to take care of ourselves, in big ways and small, as we prepare for take-off.

Mystical identity

A random chapter of the Tao Te Ching for this sunny and breezy afternoon in early May.

I'm presenting it in four versions: the first from the Stephen Mitchell interpretation maintained by Brooklyn College-CUNY; the second, the Jane English and Gia-fu Feng version; the third by the translator Red Pine; and the fourth by Taoist scholar Ellen M. Chen.

You'll notice that each interpretation refers to the subject matter in different terms. Mitchell calls it primal identity, English calls it primal union, while Red Pine says "dark union"; "dark" perhaps being a reference to the feminine, receptive, and/or that which is not easily perceived using our ordinary senses and intellectual processes.

Chen's reference to "mystical identity" pulls all of the interpretations together. While at first glance the differences seem confusing and contradictory, in fact that's what mysticism is all about ... union, the interconnectedness of all things, which is our primal characteristic. ("Primal" in its meaning of first importance or fundamental.)

As this chapter demonstrates, popular misconceptions notwithstanding, mystical can also be quite practical.

56

Those who know don't talk.
Those who talk don't know.

Close your mouth,
block off your senses,
blunt your sharpness,
untie your knots,
soften your glare,
settle your dust.
This is the primal identity.

Be like the Tao.
It can't be approached or withdrawn from,
benefited or harmed,
honored or brought into disgrace.
It gives itself up continually.
That is why it endures.

56

Those who know do not talk.
Those who talk do not know.

Keep your mouth closed.
Guard your senses.
Temper your sharpness.
Simplify your problems.
Mask your brightness.
Be at one with the dust of the earth.
This is primal union.

He who has achieved this state
Is unconcerned with friends and enemies,
With good and harm, with honour and disgrace.
This therefore is the highest state of man.

56

Those who know don't talk
those who talk don't know
seal the opening
close the gate
dull the edge
untie the tangle
soften the light
join the dust
this is called the Dark Union
it can't be embraced
it can't be abandoned
it can't be helped
it can't be harmed
it can't be exalted
it can't be debased
thus does the world exalt it.

56

One who knows does not speak.
One who speaks does not know.

Stop the apertures,
Close the door;
Blunt the sharp,
Untie the entangled;
Harmonize the bright,
Make identical the dust
This is called the mystical identity.

Therefore with this person you cannot
    get intimate.
Cannot get distant,
Cannot benefit,
Cannot harm,
Cannot exalt,
Cannot humiliate.
Therefore such person is the exalted
    of the world.

Living the questions

... I would like to beg you, dear Sir, as well as I can, to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.

-- Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet (1903)

This quote from the poet Rilke has been one of my favorites since I first read it, early in my adult life. It became almost like a mantra to me. In a time when analysis, control, and the need for certainty seem to be cultural obsessions, these words remind us of the value of not knowing and of proceeding from that standpoint. This applies to the creative process as well as to our individual and collective lives. It recognizes the mystery of life, and points out that something vital is lost when we try to plan, understand and control every step of our existence.

I don't know if it's a function of my age, or whether it's my own personal path, but I've reached a point where some of my early questions have lived their way, at least partially, into answers. Along the way, the questions have metamorphosed, many times over. Things now don't look at all like I thought they would. Much better, in some respects, but it's a bittersweet realization, and requires a good bit of grieving and letting go of what was, and what could have been.

It's as if I've spent so many years observing and experiencing things from so many different angles -- or to use another analogy, it's been like gazing through a kaleidoscope, continually changing the view -- and finally I've come to a moment where the pieces are all lining up into a coherent and simple image of perfect clarity.

The challenge

New Moon in Taurus this past Friday: a challenge to all of us, individually and collectively, to take a stand for ourselves and our planet. What do we value? What do we want? What supports us and feels right for us ... with the emphasis on "feels"? There is a way through, and it doesn't have much to do with intellectualizing about what's going on or trying to "figure things out" mentally.

It's time now for us to perceive and consider things at a different level of our human abilities -- sensing deeply and awarely with our physical bodies, and being open to receiving the invaluable input of our emotions and intuition. In our interactions with each other and the world around us, we've been functioning pretty much as though we're just disembodied heads. In the process, we've lost touch with something vital, including our power to discern what is real and what isn't; and that's led to our present loss of control over our lives, our inability to make reality-based, effective and thoughtful decisions and choices, or even to interact meaningfully with each other. (If you want a clear demonstration of that, you need look no further than the Internet and the mass media.)

As the biblical saying goes, May those who have eyes, see; and those who have ears, hear.

We need to get our eyes and our ears back in proper working order, and that's only done by actually doing it, using all of our abilities, not simply by thinking about it or watching a movie about someone doing it, or by chatting about it on an online forum. (Those activities can have a role to play, but they're not all there is, or even the most important part.)

A random chapter of the Tao Te Ching for this tumultuous and adventurous time  ...

53

The great Way is easy,
yet people prefer the side paths.
Be aware when things are out of balance.
Stay centered within the Tao.

When rich speculators prosper
while farmers lose their land;
when government officials spend money
on weapons instead of cures;
when the upper class is extravagant and irresponsible
while the poor have nowhere to turn-
all this is robbery and chaos.
It is not in keeping with the Tao.

 

Eternity in an hour

To see a World in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour.

A robin redbreast in a cage
Puts all heaven in a rage.

[...]

A skylark wounded in the wing,
A cherubim does cease to sing.
The game-cock clipt and arm'd for fight
Does the rising sun affright.

Every wolf's and lion's howl
Raises from hell a human soul.

The wild deer, wand'ring here and there,
Keeps the human soul from care.
The lamb misuse'd breeds public strife,
And yet forgives the butcher's knife.

[...]

A truth that's told with bad intent
Beats all the lies you can invent.

It is right it should be so;
Man was made for joy and woe;
And when this we rightly know,
Thro' the world we safely go.

Joy and woe are woven fine,
A clothing for the soul divine.
Under every grief and pine
Runs a joy with silken twine.

The babe is more than swaddling bands;
Every farmer understands.
Every tear from every eye
Becomes a babe in eternity;

This is caught by females bright,
And return'd to its own delight.
The bleat, the bark, bellow, and roar,
Are waves that beat on heaven's shore.

[...]

Every night and every morn
Some to misery are born,
Every morn and every night
Some are born to sweet delight.

Some are born to sweet delight,
Some are born to endless night.

We are led to believe a lie
When we see not thro' the eye,
Which was born in a night to perish in a night,
When the soul slept in beams of light.

God appears, and God is light,
To those poor souls who dwell in night;
But does a human form display
To those who dwell in realms of day.

-- William Blake, "Auguries of Innocence"

Chickadee in apple tree, waiting its turn at the birdfeeder

Passage

This is a time for a deep let-go. Allow any pain, sorrow, or difficulty just to be there, accepting its "facticity." It is very much like the experience of Gautam Buddha when, after years of seeking, he finally gave up, knowing there was nothing more that he could do. That very night, he became enlightened.

Transformation comes, like death, in its own time. And, like death, it takes you from one dimension into another.

-- "Transformation", from the Osho Zen Tarot

I will not die an unlived life

I will not die an unlived life.
I will not live in fear of falling
or of catching fire.
I choose to inhabit my days,
to allow my living to open me,
making me less afraid,
more accessible;
to loosen my heart
so that it becomes a wing,
a torch, a promise.
I choose to risk my significance,
to live so that that which comes to me as seed
goes to the next as blossom,
and that which comes to me as blossom
goes on as fruit.

-- Dawna Markova

Hovel

Painful it is indeed,
Passing through the world;
But in a hovel like this,
I live on in peace and quiet,
Winter rain falling.

-- Nijoin no Sanuki, 12th century Buddhist monk and poet,
as quoted in the Little Zen Calendar, March 31, 2009

While my home isn't exactly what I'd call a "hovel", this little poem speaks to me of simplicity and sanctuary, of dedication and determination. The hovel is not a place; to me it signifies an attitude of mind and heart. What is truly important? What are the essentials in my life? Can I let go of that which is not essential and does not serve me?

As the insanity and brutality and all-around noisiness of the world rages at fever pitch -- rather like that ten-day blizzard that came through during the Winter Solstice -- I remain safe and warm by focusing on the present moment and by not getting caught up in the collective grasping and raging. The more I stay grounded in the process of my own life, in touch with nature, with an attitude of acceptance and maintaining my boundaries, the more peacefully and effectively I will make my way through.

This reminds me of one of my favorite Little Zen Calendar quotes:

I go on walking
Higan lilies go on blooming

-- Taneda Santöka (1888-1940)

I've been through a lot in the ten years or so since I first read those words, enough to know now for sure: no matter what, I go on walking.

Revolution / Resolution

A random chapter of the Tao Te Ching for this rainy St. Paddy's Day:

36

If you want to shrink something,
you must first allow it to expand.
If you want to get rid of something,
you must first allow it to flourish.
If you want to take something,
you must first allow it to be given.
This is called the subtle perception
of the way things are.

The soft overcomes the hard.
The slow overcomes the fast.
Let your workings remain a mystery.
Just show people the results.

Doorways

It's been a long winter, a long season on an even longer road, but it feels as if a corner has been turned.

So many days over the past few months, I've awakened feeling depressed or anxious, sometimes to the point of panic, without knowing exactly why. I learned a long time ago that if I just get up and get moving, and not get caught up in believing that to be my "truth", I'm usually able to move myself out of that state. Some days recently it's felt like being on rollercoaster of emotions and energy levels ... up and down, all over the place, from one moment to the next. Lately I've found myself going through periods of great irritation, where I don't feel comfortable inside my own skin and where nothing seems to work right; where everything feels cumbersome and out of kilter.

From what people are telling me, there are a lot of us experiencing this. The usual inclination in this kind of circumstance is to reach out for something to grab onto -- some belief or goal, or a category to stick the experience in, or some thought or activity familiar and comfortable -- but that doesn't seem to work very well now. I've felt kind of "floaty", having let go of so much of what I identified with, in the midst of moving into new ways of thinking and relating to myself and the world. Sometimes I find myself stewing about it all, being so far out of my comfort zone but knowing that I can't (and don't want to) go back.

Then I hear a voice inside saying, "it's cool. Just let it be for now." The only reliable ground I have right now is inside myself, what I know and feel. And isn't that great? What a wonderful place to be. Maybe that's one of the many gifts this time has for me (and I know I'm not the only one): to meet that point of trust inside of myself, that I've finally accessed because I got to where I had no choice.

I just came across this quote. Boy, did it bring back memories of the time when I first heard it, in the excellent "Power of Myth" series of interviews Bill Moyers did with Joseph Campbell in the late 1980s. There's been a lot of water under the bridge since then, literally and figuratively, but it is still as inspiring today as it was then. Since Campbell first said it, the phrase "follow your bliss" has gotten to be something of a cliché, but doggone it, it's true. Maybe we need to hear it, and hear it, and hear it some more. It's helped me through the last 20 years, that's for certain. And here I am again.

If you follow your bliss, you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living. When you can see that, you begin to meet people who are in the field of your bliss, and they open the doors to you. I say, follow your bliss and don't be afraid, and doors will open where you didn't know there were doors.

--Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth

Tao Te Ching

Quite often I post quotes from the Tao Te Ching here on my blog, and I've had some comments and questions about it. The Tao Te Ching, pronounced something like "Dow-duh-JING", is one of the classical texts of the philosophical system known as Taoism and is purported to have been written by the legendary ancient Chinese philosopher Lao Tse (also spelled Lao-Tzu or Laozi).

As with many legends, there may or may not have been an actual person named Lao Tse, in the same way as there may or may not have been someone named William Shakespeare. But as with Shakespeare's plays, the work speaks for itself, having been written in a time when the "cult of personality" wasn't as important as it is now. (Well, I'm assuming it wasn't.)

There are many reasons why I am attracted to the Tao Te Ching, and to Taoist philosophy in general. One of the main ones is that it is based on the natural world ... the rhythms and cycles of the life process, as it is reflected in nature, and as a metaphor for human existence and creativity. Much of my own poetry is written from this standpoint, using allusions from nature. And with the current chaos and constant change in the world, I find that the more I can stay grounded and in touch with the Earth and its energy, the more balanced I am.

The version of the Tao Te Ching I quote and link to is this one, maintained on the Brooklyn College/City University of New York website, based on a modern interpretation by the eminent scholar, poet and translator Stephen Mitchell. There are numerous other translations, most famously the more traditional 1972 version, re-released in 1997, by Jane English that is illustrated with the wonderful photography of Gia-Fu Feng.

Stephen Mitchell himself has a new book out, entitled The Second Book of the Tao, which just arrived in my P. O. Box from Powell's Books.

Needing ground

March came in like a lion ... here's hoping it goes out like a lamb.

I'm feeling rather weary today.

Random chapter from the Tao Te Ching:

7

The Tao is infinite, eternal.
Why is it eternal?
It was never born;
thus it can never die.
Why is it infinite?
It has no desires for itself;
thus it is present for all beings.

The Master stays behind;
that is why she is ahead.
She is detached from all things;
that is why she is one with them.
Because she has let go of herself,
she is perfectly fulfilled.

In the interim

Random chapter of the Tao Te Ching:

22

If you want to become whole,
let yourself be partial.
If you want to become straight,
let yourself be crooked.
If you want to become full,
let yourself be empty.
If you want to be reborn,
let yourself die.
If you want to be given everything,
give everything up.

The Master, by residing in the Tao,
sets an example for all beings.
Because he doesn't display himself,
people can see his light.
Because he has nothing to prove,
people can trust his words.
Because he doesn't know who he is,
people recognize themselves in him.
Because he has no goal in mind,
everything he does succeeds.

When the ancient Masters said,
"If you want to be given everything,
give everything up,"
they weren't using empty phrases.
Only in being lived by the Tao can you be truly yourself.

Wild hearts day

Late this chilly afternoon, I bundled up and took a drive up the Gorge to the recycling transfer site (fancy name for the town dump), and got so carried away ogling the scenery it's a wonder I made it back home in one piece.

The sun had come out, spot-lighting snow-covered nooks and crannies on the cliffs high above the river and glowing through the clouds that clung to the peaks. As the clouds formed and re-formed, the interplay of light and shadow constantly shifted. Fog wafted around in the little valleys between the peaks and floated out into the Gorge. The wind was calm, so the river's surface was still and reflective ... mirroring the deep green of the Douglas firs on the mountainsides below the snow level, the glistening white snow above, as well as the patches of blue sky that peeked out here and there from behind the clouds. I passed numerous stands of birch, bare of their leaves, like ranks of silvery-brown skeletons.

There was an invigorating wildness to it, and yet at the same time it seemed peaceful and orderly.

More inspiration on this gloriously elemental Valentine's Day:

Wild woman resides in the guts, not in the head. She can track and run and summon and repel. She is the Life/Death/Life force, she is the incubator. She is intuition, she is far-seer, she is deep listener, she is loyal heart. She encourages humans to remain multi-lingual; fluent in the languages of dreams, passion, and poetry. She whispers from night dreams, she leaves behind on the terrain of a woman's soul a coarse hair and muddy footprints. These fill women with longing to find her, free her and love her.

-- Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Women Who Run With the Wolves

Groundhog Day

Random chapter of the Tao Te Ching:

54

Whoever is planted in the Tao
will not be rooted up.
Whoever embraces the Tao
will not slip away.
Her name will be held in honor
from generation to generation.

Let the Tao be present in your life
and you will become genuine.
Let it be present in your family
and your family will flourish.
Let it be present in your country
and your country will be an example
to all countries in the world.
Let it be present in the universe
and the universe will sing.

How do I know this is true?
By looking inside myself.

Inaugural Poem

The beginning and final stanzas of the poem composed and read by essayist, poet, and teacher Elizabeth Alexander at the presidential inauguration, January 20, 2009:

Praise Song for the Day

A Poem for Barack Obama's Presidential Inauguration

Each day we go about our business,
walking past each other, catching each other's
eyes or not, about to speak or speaking.

All about us is noise. All about us is
noise and bramble, thorn and din, each
one of our ancestors on our tongues.

[...]

Some live by love thy neighbor as thyself,
others by first do no harm or take no more
than you need. What if the mightiest word is love?

Love beyond marital, filial, national,
love that casts a widening pool of light,
love with no need to pre-empt grievance.

In today's sharp sparkle, this winter air,
any thing can be made, any sentence begun.
On the brink, on the brim, on the cusp,

praise song for walking forward in that light.

"Praise Song for the Day" will be published in chapbook version by Elizabeth Alexander's publisher, Greywolf Press, next month. Meanwhile, the entire poem may be read online here. I've printed it out and put it where I can see it everyday ... on the fridge.

Let it be

When I find myself in times of trouble
Mother Mary comes to me,
Speaking words of wisdom, let it be.

And in my hour of darkness
She is standing right in front of me,
Speaking words of wisdom, let it be.

Let it be, let it be,
Let it be, let it be.
Whisper words of wisdom, let it be.

And when the broken hearted people
Living in the world agree,
There will be an answer, let it be.

For though they may be parted there is
Still a chance that they will see
There will be an answer, let it be.

Let it be, let it be,
Let it be, let it be. Yeah
There will be an answer, let it be.

And when the night is cloudy,
There is still a light that shines on me,
Shine on until tomorrow, let it be.

I wake up to the sound of music
Mother Mary comes to me,
Speaking words of wisdom, let it be.

Let it be, let it be,
Let it be, let it be.
There will be an answer, let it be.

Let it be, let it be,
Let it be, let it be.
Whisper words of wisdom, let it be.

-- "Let It Be" , Paul McCartney/John Lennon