There are few times in life where I have been aware of
myself in life, as life, and not as myself observing life. Some people refer to
them as peak experiences or moments of insights—a glimpse of everything as
perfection and myself as a part of that perfection.
But they have been far too rare and only “glimpses.” I
have never experienced those moments by seeking after them, but have merely
“found” myself in one. As a child, they came while walking in the woods or just
sitting with my back against a tree, watching a squirrel. As an adult, I
remember three vivid examples of these divine portals beyond feelings,
perceptions, impulses, and words.
One occurred on a late September afternoon, overlooking
Canandaigua Lake while standing on the deck of a friend’s condominium built
into the side of a steep hill. My hosts and other guests went into the condo,
taking with them their happy leaf-peeping party chatter, and I remained,
watching a lone tern ride drafts against a dark, cloudy sky. That was all. But
time stopped, thoughts stopped, my sense of self stopped—I was exhilarated by
an immense joy beyond reason or cause. I wanted to describe it to my companions
when I joined them again, but had no words.
Two other experiences happened in far less poetic
settings. One day I glanced out the window near my desk, taking a break from my
work and computer screen, and noticed my elderly neighbor brushing the snow
from his car. I watched for a few minutes that seemed like hours. Nothing
happened that I hadn’t seen a million times before, but his slow, attentive,
careful, and caring snow brushing penetrated my heart with a simple yet
brilliant love for my neighbor, myself, everyone, and everything.
Another time where I experienced the grace of a peek into
the perfection of everything was while lying in bed, ill, and in pain. I had
been ill for sometime. I was exhausted and depressed by the pain, and the lack
of promise for a quick resolution. For some reason, I was able to truly relax
“into” the pain, depression, and fear. I was able to be in it, as an experience
alone—not characterized as bad, or pain, suffering. At that precise moment, I
wasn’t me. For a moment between the rushing screams of thoughts coming from
everywhere, there was no me—but there I was and I knew that I was.
Some might describe these experiences as described in the
Bible, in Philippians 4:7: "And the peace of God, which passeth all
understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus."
The Indian Poet Rabindranath Tagore was watching the sun
rise in a Calcutta street when he wrote, “suddenly, in a moment, a veil seemed
to be lifted from my eyes….There was nothing and no one whom I did not love at
that moment.”
From a Buddhist perspective, I think of these of
experiences as glimpses of enlightenment, or temporarily experiencing what is
referred to as Shunyata,
emptiness, or suchness. Someone who has
reached total enlightenment is a Buddha. The Buddha referred to himself as
Tathagata, which means "one who has thus come" or "one who has
thus gone." Either way it means one who resides totally in "suchness."
To truly understand or reside in suchness is, as described
in the 5th century Chinese Mahaya scripture, Awakening of Faith in the Mahayana, "the highest
wisdom which shines throughout the world, it has true knowledge and a mind
resting simply in its own being. It is eternal, blissful, its own self-being
and the purest simplicity."
The great prajnaparamita mantra, from The Heart Sutra, praises this
enlightenment: “Gate Gate Paragate Parasamgate Bodhi Svaha. Gone, Gone, Gone
Beyond, Gone Altogether Beyond, O What An Awakening, All Hail!”
I don't believe that awakening is foreign to us. I believe
we have all glimpsed it. The Heart
Sutra reassures us that we are in fact the stuff of suchness; we have this
enlightenment potential in us because “Whatever is form, that is emptiness;
whatever is emptiness that is form.”
This long introduction is a way of initiating a new
element of my blog: poetry. I have written lots of poetry over the years and
hope I keep writing poetry in the years to come. It is through poetry that I
have been able to express my Buddha nature by expressing things exactly as they
are. It is only in poetry that I feel I can speak to you without the
restriction of the form of words—stopping time, ending the separation between
us, and uniting us in the immersion of suchness.
Yes, I use words to write poetry, but the form of these
words come from suchness
itself, come from all life outside of me, through me, to you. As Shunryu Suzuki
said “when you do something, you should burn yourself completely, like a good
bonfire, leaving no trace of yourself.”
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