Someone asked, “what is my true nature?”
If you search for your “true’ nature, you grant the existence of a “false” one.
If you make no attempt to define your nature, you will find nothing in it that is not true.*
*cited:
Japanese Death Poems
Yoel Hoffmann
“What is the cause of everything? …everything relies on everything else in order to manifest. A flower has to rely on non-flower elements in order to manifest. If you look deeply into the flower, you can recognize non-flower elements. Looking into the flower, you recognize the element sunshine; that is a non-flower element. Without sunshine, a flower cannot manifest. Looking at the flower, you recognize the element cloud; that is a non-flower element. Without clouds, the flower cannot manifest. Other elements are essential, such as minerals, soil, the farmer and so on; a multitude of non-flower elects has come together in order to help the flower manifest.”
~Thich Nhat Hanh, No Fear, No Death
carving aged faces
sunset by sunset – whitening streaked hair
days of yesterdays
Delicate … the dance
of light and shadow
between insight and ignorance
in life and death
from suffering to tranquility
May you become acquainted with tranquil single-pointed concentration . . . those who seek wisdom through the lens of tranquility glimpse reality in the same manner as a lighted candle — the light chases away that which is hidden within the shadows of a darken closet. Insight, once risen, shines light into closed hearts and minds and keeps the gloom of ignorance at bay
Ritva Sillanmaki invites lens-artists photographers to “see beyond the surface” and “focus on the shapes, colors, textures, and patterns of the subject, rather than its literal representation.”
Some of the images below were created through the use of double exposure, shutter speed, focus, light and shadow, and gift of nature’s beauty.
If I say
this or that,
how ordinary grief becomes –
broken cries are the words
that sorrow’s voice demands
~Izumi Shikibu*
*cited:
The Ink Dark Moon
Trans: J Hirshfield & M Aratani
How peaceful is
Every single dawn;
I gaze out, yet
Still in the depths of night
I dream…a grief, indeed.
~Princess Shokushi*
When I look up at
The wide-stretched plain of heaven,
Is the moon the same
That rose on Mount Mikasa
In the land of Kasuga? ~Abe-no Nakamaro*
Leica V-Lux 5 … f/4 1/10s 32.65mm
* Trans: Clay MacCauley, Single Songs of a Hundred Poets
Every life is a point of view directed upon the universe. Strictly speaking, what one life sees no other can. Every individual, . . . is an organ, for which there can be no substitute, constructed for the apprehension of truth . . . Without the development, the perpetual change and the inexhaustible series of adventures which constitute life, the universe, or absolutely valid truth, would remain unknown . . . Reality happens to be like a landscape, possessed of an infinite number of perspectives, all equally veracious and authentic. The sole false perspective is that which claims to be the only one there is. ~José Ortega y Gasset
Fujifilm X-T4: f/5 1/2200 s 80 mm 640 ISO
“For remembrance of her I wanted to write about her,”… but I stopped short with the words, “Ink seems to have frozen up, I cannot write any more.” *
How shall I gather memories of my sister?
The stream of letters is congealed.
No comfort may be found in icicles
~The Sarashina Diary (Diaries of Court Ladies of Old Japan)
*The continuous writing of the cursive Japanese characters is often compared to a meandering river. “Ink seems to have frozen up” means that her eyes are dim with tears, and no more she can write continuously and flowingly.
a meditative journey 
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