A Free Interpration (in verse)
Zen Master Dogen’s instructions for sitting-meditation
a free interpretation by Mike Cross, Autumn 2005
Let Dogen tell the truth he found:
Enlightenment is all around.
So don’t go trying, when you sit,
To grasp or hold or polish it.
There again, don’t be too proud
There again, don’t be too proud
And hold your head up in a cloud.
Don’t think you’ve grasped the truth of action
While still a slave to blind reaction.
Ancient sages sat and sat;
Ancient sages sat and sat;
We should also be like that.
To be too verbal is a sin;
Let us turn our light within:
A journey home with empty hands,
A journey home with empty hands,
In backward steps through pleasant lands,
Where form and essence fall away:
We pray for That. Now let us play.
*
A quiet room is good for Zen;
For food and drink, take five from ten.
Thoughts abound of right and wrong;
The will to stop them must be strong.
Did Buddha try to Buddha be?
He did not, and nor should we.
The normal mind may be just It,
The normal mind may be just It,
But common folk do not thus sit.
*
*
Where we sit we lay a mat
And place a cushion over that.
When we sit the legs are crossed:
This ancient form must not be lost.
With right on left, left on right,
Love the truth with all thy might.
Most of all, love true uprightness.
Most of all, love true uprightness.
That doesn’t mean to do (uptightness).
An ideal posture is not bent;
Still, do not do. Have clear intent.
But not intent with furrowed brow;
But not intent with furrowed brow;
What we wish is to allow.
Allow antagonistic flows;
Allow antagonistic flows;
Ears and shoulders; navel - nose.
A sitting posture that I know
Does not express the will to grow.
Allow the breath; the breath is real.
Allow the breath; the breath is real.
To breathe is not to think or feel.
Don’t hold the breath, or turn the wheel.
Just let it flow. Intend to heal.
Intent is not a thing to banish;
Intent is not a thing to banish;
When all is healed, negations vanish.
Far beyond intent and feeling,
Just to sit is natural healing
*
*
This sitting is to meditate;
It’s peace and ease; a Dharma Gate.
This meditation is to sit:
Let’s hope to be enslaved by it.
A sport for body, heart, and soul:
Trying, failing, to be whole.
Trying, failing, to allow:
When it happens, God knows how.
* * * * *
posted by Mike Cross at 12:57 PM
3 Comments:
Thank you, g, for your comment.
You seem to express a certain skepticism about the idea of strengthening the Will.
But I think that the force of habit is a kind of stream. Unless we establish a certain strength of will to oppose this stream, it controls us, so that we are purely creatures of habitual reaction, turning on the wheel of samsara.
To expose one's photos to public criticism requires a certain amount of courage, but to oppose habitual streams, firstly within oneself, and then secondly by attempting to express the Buddha's teaching verbally, perhaps requires even more strength of purpose.
FM Alexander wrote that the great principle of hiw work was "antagonistic action."
In Fukan Zazengi Master Dogen wrote, literally, "MIMI TO KATA TO TAISHI, HANA TO HESO TO TAI SESHIMEN KOTO O YOSU," "It is vital to allow the ears to oppose the shoulders and the nose to oppose the navel."
When I first translated these words, before starting Alexander work, the literal meaning of these words didn't make sense to me. So I translated them as: "It is vital to align the ears with the shoulders..." or some such nonsense.
Most translations of Fukan-zazengi fall into the same trap.
Nowadays, when I read other people's translations of these words, I feel confident that I hit the target but they didn't. Alexander work gave me that confidence.
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