poetry

wpc: transient

this rain

a greeting card from heaven

midsummer heat.

~Issa (www.haikuguy.com)

What are the various conditions—past and present, known and unknown—that come together to create raindrops? Scientists have suggested that the interactions between water vapor, dust particles, and wind turbulence within clouds create millimeter-sized droplets which are heavy enough to begin their descent towards earth. And in the process of falling, the droplets accumulate more and more moisture, becoming the raindrops we see on the ground.

wpc_transant

This scientific explanation of how raindrops form invites contemplation of the prior conditions that create vapor, dust, and wind. Each of these transient phenomenon is a telling of the ongoing weaving and unweaving of interconnected threads creating the various phenomena we experience within each given moment.

This weaving and unweaving of threads is noted by Thich Nhat Hanh, “This is, because that is. This is not, because that is not. This is born, because that is born. This dies, because that dies.”

interconnected

When you look at a leaf or a raindrop, meditate on all the conditions, near and distant, that have contributed to the presence of that leaf or raindrop. Know that the world is woven of interconnected threads. This is, because that is. This is not, because that is not. This is born because that is born. This dies, because that dies.

The birth and death of any dharma are connected to the birth and death of all other dharms. The one contains the many and the many contain the one. Without the one, there cannot be the many. Without the many, there cannot be the one.

…the interconnected links consist of many layers and levels…

~Thich Nhat Hanh (Old Path White Clouds)

interconnected

 

the world seems…

Is it because my mind

keeps dwelling

on every worldly thing

the the word seems

more hateful to me than ever?

~SaigyO  (Poems of a Mountain Home)

doubleexposurebuddha

SaigyO was born in 1118 in the capital city, Kyoto.  When he was twenty-two he suddenly left his post as an elite private guard of Emperor Toba to become a Buddhist  priest.  I find it interesting how his poem written almost a thousand years ago resonates with me today especially when I think of Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr’s (who was born in 1808) translated epigram, “the more things change, the more they stay the same.”