Time and Timelessness

Urban living;

Its 7 AM

Its 9 AM

Its 1 PM

Its 5 PM

Its 7 PM

Its 9 PM

Its 11 PM

Rural living;

Sunrising

Sunsetting

Dusking

Moonrising

Moonsetting

Dawning

Inconstancy

Pulling out
Implosion-like force
Out of the eye
        Dying into birth

Pulling in
Explosion-like force
Into the eye
        Birth into dying

Mindness

Like a wind it blows
Through blood'n'bones
Seeping into lungs
On the breathing sails

No matter where it is
Looking at the same moon
A cancer-like nature
Parasitic thoughts

The Thinker

"I will stop thinking!" -
the thinker is thinking.

The Point of Zazen

Realisation, neither general nor particular,
is effort without desire.
Clear water all the way to the bottom;
a fish swims like a fish.
Vast sky transparent throughout;
a bird flies like a bird.

- Eihei Dogen

Portrait of Dogen Viewing the Moon

*Poem on the portrait written by Dogen in 1249.

Fresh, clear spirit covers old mountain man this autumn.
Donkey stares at the sky ceiling; glowing white moon floats.
Nothing approaches. Nothing else included.
Bouyant, I let myself go-filled with gruel, filled with rice.
Lively flapping from head to tail,
Sky above, sky beneath, cloud self, water origin.

On Zazen Practice by Dogen

The moon
abiding in the midst of
serene mind;
billows break
into light.

* Dogen teaches; Zazen is not merely a method by which one reaches awakening, but is itself awakening.