The continuation of the spiritual journey really depends on how crazy we’re willing to be.
– Reggie Ray
I had no idea I’d end up this crazy. Or this contented. Or this fulfilled. Don’t ask me about happiness – it’s a sub-category these days. Imagine being happy to be unhappy? Imagine being contented to feel like shit? Imagine being at peace with pain and weariness? Imagine being ok with depression, flatness, confusion? If this isn’t your version of liberation I totally understand. (We all start out on this journey imagining ‘waking up’ will magically erase all discomfort from our experience.)
But this absurd liberation lives here, and this is what the crazy cow offers tonight: five three-liners of the slightly nonsensical variety. They like to think they are haiku, but would duck and hide in the presence of ‘real’ haiku. Apologies for my warping of noble zen aphorisms, koans and haiku. I mean no disrespect; after all these years they are deeply embroidered in the fabric of this brain and have a life of their own.
My sanity does too. Where the hell did I put it?
–
old flesh, old bones
on the zafu, aches come and go
just like I used to
–
~
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weary old mind
data flows in, data drops out
plop!
–
~
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music to my ears…
the sound of someone else
chopping
–
~
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puddle on zafu
old cow’s melted-down stories
moo!
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~
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relentless koan:
what is the sound of my neighbor’s dog
barking?
~
About the image. This delightful brush drawing comes from the cover of an exhibition catalogue: L’Au-delà dans l’art japonaise. Paris 1963. Nowhere in the book does it mention the name of the artist whose work is featured on the cover. My instincts tend towards Sengai… what do you think?
echoes from emptiness 