at times I hear…

One thousand peaks merge with frozen clouds;

ten thousand paths have no human trace.

Day by day just facing the wall,

at times I hear snow drift over the window.

                                                                          ~Ryokan*

kofford_b_handsacrosskeyboard 2

*cited:

Sky Above, Great Wind

Kazuaki Tanahashi

weekly photo challenge: shadowed

We meet and we part.

Coming and going–hearts like passing clouds.

Except for the marks of a frosty-hair brush,

human traces are hard to find.

                                                                 ~Ryokan*

DSC_1612Weeklyphotochallengeshadow2

visit The Daily Post to view or participate in Jen’s photo challenge: shadowed

*cited:

Sky Above, Great Wind

Kazuaki Tanahashi

every face passes by…

cicadas at nightfall–

every face passes by

without speaking a word

                                                             ~Ishibashi Hideno*

faces passing by

faces passing by

*cited:

Far Beyond the Field

Makoto Ueda

at last free…

At last free,

at last I am a woman free!

No more tied to the kitchen,

stained amid the stained pots,

no more bound to the husband

who thought me less

than the shade he wove with his hands.

No more anger, no more hunger,

I sit now in the shade of my own tree.

Meditating thus, I am happy, I am serene.

                                                                            ~Sumangalamata*

oldtownshadows 1

*”Sumangala’s Mother,” the wife of a maker of hats and shade-umbrellas, was a member of the earliest community of women followers of the Buddha.

cited:

Women in Praise of the Sacred

Ed: Jane Hirshfield