At the Bomb Testing Site At noon in the desert a panting lizard waited for history, its elbows tense, watching the curve of a particular road as if something might happen. It was looking at something farther off than people could see, an important scene acted in stone for little selves at the flute end of consequences. There was just a continent without much on it under a sky that …
The Nature & Object Of Perception
This Q & A compliments of Atmananda Krishna Menon: What is the nature and object of perception? A Jnyanin [Sage] perceives the Absolute, diversified as objects. Ignorant men, identifying themselves with the gross body, perceive gross objects. Others, standing as mind, perceive only subtle objects. Jnyanins, standing as Consciousness, perceive only Consciousness. * …
Sabbath
From Wendell Berry's introduction to This Day: Collected & New Sabbath Poems: The poems come incidentally or they do not come at all. If the Muse leaves me alone, I leave her alone. To be quiet, even wordless, in a good place is a better gift than poetry. * …
Practice Notes: Evidence of the Afterlife
Was standing in line at the post office yesterday. Very long line, of course, since it is the week before Christmas. But I came prepared—with the joyously upbeat music of Ladysmith Black Mambazo streaming via Pandora on my phone. So with earbuds snuggly placed, mostly I was feeling content to be there. Every now and again, some slightly-prickly thoughts and queries: * Why on earth are …
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Fasting Of The Heart-Mind
The Whole Being Listens Here's an interpretive rendering—via Christian mystic Thomas Merton—of a passage from the Chuang Tzu that describes a Taoist practice known as "fasting of the heart-mind." The basic idea is to notice the difference between three levels of hearing: (1) hearing with the ears; (3) hearing with the heart-mind (i.e. intellectual and/or emotional understanding); and (3) …
Ceaselessly Musing
A Noiseless Patient Spider A noiseless patient spider, I mark’d where on a little promontory it stood isolated, Mark’d how to explore the vacant vast surrounding, It launch’d forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself, Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them. And you O my soul where you stand, Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space, Ceaselessly musing, …