I was navigating the backroads home one evening when I happened upon a committee of turkey vultures closing in on the carcass of a possum lying there amidst the stubble of cornfield. They were waddling and hopping and gliding toward it until I interrupted them by rolling to a stop not too far away. I watched them for a bit, marveling at their bald heads and their interesting combination of awkwardness and grace. Soon, though, I began to feel guilty for keeping them from their dinner, so I moved on.

We often think of vultures as ugly birds, hideous and disgusting even, simply for being what they are. I’ve come to view them much more compassionately, however, for reasons that will become clear. I even had my heartstrings tugged by one who’d made the mistake of feeding on the crumpled body of a deer too close to the roadside, only to end up flattened beneath the tires of a fast-moving vehicle. Even scavengers are sometimes denied the simple pleasure of a putrid meal in this cruel world!

We humans often think of ourselves as beings of such refinement, don’t we? Unlike the vultures, we dine in places both comfortable to the body and pleasing to the eye. We delight in flavors both subtle and bold, intriguing and familiar. We wield our cutlery with delicate precision, and dab at the corners of our mouths whenever our lips become too moist. We celebrate dishes of elegant simplicity and creative complexity alike, crafted by artisans toiling in their kitchens to elevate to the highest levels the offerings of farmers, butchers, fishermen, and so forth. This dining experience is not simply for survival’s sake. We would do this for the sheer enjoyment of it regardless of the nature of our existence. At least that’s what we like to pretend. We dare not think of ourselves as hunters and gatherers with blood and mud matted in our hair and caked underneath our fingernails. No, that was a previous lifetime, one from which we’ve evolved so far we can scarcely imagine it any longer.

Perhaps that’s why turkey vultures disgust some of us so. We catch glimpses of them riding the air currents, ever-vigilant for the scent of decay, and we’re reminded of what we’d just as soon forget – that death lies in wait just over our horizon, or even in our midst. As much as we’d like to keep it at arm’s length with rituals of refinement, one day it will come for us and there’ll be nothing we can say or do about it. But whereas we might like to run and hide from death, the turkey vulture seeks it out and embraces it. Death is life to them. They thrust their bald heads into its fetid piles and commence to ripping and tearing it with gusto. They fill their bellies with its rotting mess and fly away, to feed their young and then return for more.

When we develop insight into the true nature of emptiness, rather than thoughts of nihilism consuming us, a deep sense of compassion for all beings begins to arise

Is truth big enough to encompass these starkly different realities, and countless more for that matter? Well, off course it is. It is what is, after all. But what kind of truth transcends the reality of turkey vultures and human beings alike? For Buddhists, it is the Heart Sutra. For it is the Heart Sutra which has Avalokitesvara delivering Buddhism’s most transcendent teaching to the disciple, Sariputra, in terms such as the following:

 

Listen, Sariputra, form is emptiness (sunyata).

Emptiness is form.

Form does not differ from emptiness.

Emptiness does not differ from form.

That which is form is emptiness.

That which is emptiness is form.

The very same applies to feeling, idea, mental formations and consciousness.

Hear, Sariputra, all dharmas (everything that exists) are marked by emptiness.

They are neither created nor destroyed,

Neither defiled nor undefiled,

Neither increasing nor decreasing….

 

We arise from myriad causes and conditions to do that which we humans do. We are this form for a brief span of time, but this form is absent any absolute and permanent identity that we might call “our own.” Likewise, the turkey vultures, and all of life, and everything. We’re simply matter and energy changing form. That which disgusts one of us is life-giving to the other. That which provides one of us comfort prompts the other to flee for his life.

Vultures play a sacred role in Tibetan culture. So-called sky burials are common there. The body of the deceased is allowed to be eaten by vultures until (hopefully) nothing remains. Vultures, to the Tibetan people, are honored beings. Indeed, when we begin to see reality in terms of the emptiness that the Heart Sutra describes, we see all things as precious, sacred, and worthy of honor. As such, compassion can’t help but arise within us. We see more clearly our connectedness and commonality. Perhaps that’s why Avalokitesvara, the Bodhisattva of Compassion, was chosen to deliver this ultimate teaching on the true nature of reality – emptiness. When we develop insight into the true nature of emptiness, rather than thoughts of nihilism consuming us, a deep sense of compassion for all beings begins to arise – even for the vultures in our midst.

 

Copyright 2019 by Mark Robert Frank

All images are the property of the author unless otherwise noted.

 

 

 

Poetry is a practice that I thoroughly enjoy, but one that I engage in far too infrequently. Similarly haphazard has been my collection of the “finished” pieces. They’ve wound up here, there, and everywhere. I guess I never thought of myself as having a deep enough trove to seriously consider their publication. Some have been offered up to various email groups over the years. Others have become buried in the deep scrolls of social media. A few have enjoyed publication in one blog post or another. Many others, however, exist only in handwritten form, stashed away in drawers and filing cabinets. Perhaps it’s some sense of mortality that has me gathering them all together at this point in time. At any rate, it’s winter, and an obvious theme has come to mind at this time for at least a small collection.

Embracing Winter

I wonder at my readiness for winter
As I step into darkness
Filled with the creaking of unseen branches overhead
And crunching ice beneath my feet.

Coldness caresses coldness…

When first light breaks,
I see yesterday’s snow
Nestled in the furrows
Of a cornfield that has taken leave.

Coldness nestles within coldness…

Here,
A black pond gazes up at the gray sky,
As if calmly recognizing an old friend.

There,
A broken barn door hangs open,
Welcoming the sunless morning.

Coldness welcomes coldness…

And I, too, feel myself begin to open
To the possibility
Of welcoming another winter,
And warming up
To coldness being coldness,
And being a sun for the world
On an otherwise sunless day.

 

Where Does Mind Reside?

I wonder if geese discuss their coming flight
to warmer climes —
Clucking amongst themselves
as they bed down,
Before concluding:
“Yes, tomorrow at dawn we rise.”
Or is it a surprise even to them,
When as one suddenly they lift up
And keep on going?

Where does mind reside?
Is it in our heads,
Or do we billions hold it
In the basket of our interwoven lives?
Or is even that too small?
Perhaps nothing less than the universe itself
Could be the dwelling place
Of even the faintest glimmer of mind…

And so the geese depart,
And my mind follows,
Growing bigger and bigger
As they circle the lake,
And finally disappear,
Leaving me gazing into emptiness.

 

Mind Is Held By Everything, and Holds All Things In Turn

Earth holds the gathered rain
That holds the ice upon its surface.
Ice holds the brightening sky,
And corn stubble ‘round its ragged edge.
Sky holds the rising sun,
And clouds that wander ‘neath its gaze.
Eye holds it all within its empty cup
From which the mind drinks in 10,000 things.

Crows In Two Dimensions

Black limbs of a lone, dead tree
Lose dimension against the flat gray wash of winter,
As do the wary crows perched upon them,
Looking left, then looking right.
Only their stark cries belie their apparent lack of worldly form.

Thousand Year Old Footsteps in the Snow

I step outside and watch the snow fall
From darkness into light.
The others have already gone
For dinner in the mess hall,
But the cold feels too good on my face
To not linger for awhile.

It felt good this morning, also,
After we’d rousted ourselves from slumber at 3:40
To sit straight-backed,
With palms together –
Facing our respective walls
By the time the teacher made his rounds at 4:05.
And after two hours of absolute and utter stillness
Overlaid with daydreams,
And sleepdreams,
And stomach-growling yearning for the bell,
And wondering if I’d make it through the day,
And wondering why the hell I’m doing what I’m doing,
I stumbled out into the pre-dawn blackness
To see a shining silver sickle of a moon,
And Jupiter,
And the black sky –
As black as anything can be.

Ah, but that was light years ago…
That was this morning.
And anything that is not right now might as well be light years away.
Oh, sure, I’ve glimpsed that absolute and utter stillness
A number of times throughout the day,
But this is why I do this:
So that I can step outside and see the world
With brand new eyes –
Eyes without a “me” to tell me what I’m seeing.

So I hobble though the snow
On my zazen-weary legs,
Leaving thousand year-old footprints in the snow.
And as far as what all this amounts to
Once these bones are in the ground,
And how the hell my sitting facing a wall
For over eleven hours a day
Can possibly make the world a better place…
Well, I kind of like to think of all of this
Zazen after zazen after zazen
As stitching together the pieces of a robe
To someday be worn
By my great-great-great-great
Granddaughter in the Dharma
As she steps outside into the night
To watch the snow fall
From darkness into light
Before gliding like a shadow to the mess hall
Leaving thousand year old footsteps in the snow.

 

Walking In The Snow

Walking in the snow is a meditation
That unfolds of its own accord.
If one must speak in terms of beginnings,
Then it begins with the closing of the door behind us.
And it ends when…, well…,
Who can say when it ends?

A closing door,
A garden fencerow –
A walk in the snow quickly leaves such things behind.
And what remains are memories
Of what we want,
And what we need.

A path to walk,
A place to sit –
These will not be as they once were.
But as the snowy walk continues
The nature that is us
Becomes the nature of that which is,
And new paths,
And new places for the mind to rest
Appear.

Snow-laden bamboo
Bends to earth,
And we receive its cool embrace.
A darkened hollow beneath a rock
Invites us in,
And mind accepts.

For mind is a deer
Walking nimbly.
And mind is a rabbit
Waiting in stillness.
And mind is a tree
Rooted in the heavens.
And mind is a bird
Peering into the circle of all the world.

The pine bough bends
Beneath the weight of so much snow.
It is our teacher.
Revealing to us how we can be –
Bending without breaking
Beneath the weight of all that is.

Such teachings abound during a snowy walk:
Revealing how to subtly color all the world
With precisely the required hue,
Showing how we might stand with all beings
With the entire measure of this Life force that is “ours”,
And whispering to us that in death is Life –
What a gloriously resounding whisper to be heard!

 

 

Embracing Winter © 2018 by Mark Robert Frank. This one first appeared on the Heartland Contemplative Facebook page.

Where Does Mind Reside? © 2018 & 2019 by Mark Robert Frank. This one first appeared untitled on the Heartland Contemplative Facebook page. I also added the last line before publishing it here.

Mind Is Held By Everything, and Holds All Things In Turn © 2019 by Mark Robert Frank. This one first appeared on the Heartland Contemplative Facebook page.

Crows In Two Dimensions © 1985 & 2019 by Mark Robert Frank. This one has been sitting in my vault unpublished for over thirty years!

Thousand Year Old Footsteps in the Snow © 2011 by Mark Robert Frank. This one bounced around in personal correspondence for a bit before appearing in my first blog, Crossing Nebraska, where you can find it here. Shortly thereafter, it appeared in Just This, a publication of the Austin Zen Center.

Walking In The Snow © 2014 by Mark Robert Frank. This one also appeared first in Crossing Nebraska, where you can find it here. It also appeared on the Sanshin Zen Community Facebook page.

 

Copyright 2019 by Mark Robert Frank
(except as noted)

All images are the property of the author unless otherwise noted.

The weather is lousy outside, with sleet coating the roads, trees, and windows, and a foot of snow on the way. At least, that’s what I’ve been hearing on the local news – the foot of snow that is. The sleet I can see with my very own eyes. I can hear it, too, peppering the windows when the wind picks up, first from one side of the house and then the other. Like a child home from school on a snow day, I stand at the window surveying the backyard where everything is covered with white or dripping with ice. Absent is the usual activity of squirrels dutifully managing their stashes of nuts, rabbits hopping about tentatively as if they’ve only so much energy to spare, and starlings flitting en masse from lawn to tree to who knows where. They all seem to have simply disappeared. The squirrels I know are up there in their leafy nests, huddled together and swaying with the wind. And the rabbits are down in their unseen burrows, wonderfully insulated with grass and fur. The starlings are more of a mystery, though, at least to me. Apparently they’ve faded away into the nooks and crannies of the world – amongst the leaf litter that collects under the bushes, or in whatever other secluded hollow they might have found – there to patiently wait for the storm to pass.

I think of them calmly abiding out there in the frigid cold, hunkered down in places that are growing quieter and quieter as the ice continues to accumulate. There is great wisdom in their abiding. I know that first hand now, but only after many years of living. There is great trust in their abiding, more trust than I can usually muster. Huddling in their chosen places, with whatever food they might have collected or none at all as the case may be, they abide with innate trust that the storm will eventually abate, and it will do so before their strength runs out. They know this because they are of this world, and so they fear not that the world might conjure up a storm too furious or long-lasting for them to survive. They know they simply have to abide. And so they wait, without any contingency planning, without any fretting or lamentation, and without any pining for the day when spring will come. They simply settle into calm abiding.

Those feelings are like the wind that roars outside while you’re safe and warm in the burrow of your breath.

Calm abiding isn’t easy for us humans to do. We’re so filled with ideas about what’s fair and what should be. We’re so used to setting our own agendas and deciding what is right for us. We’re so socialized to struggle with and fight against anything that we determine is not in our best interest. That’s what strong people do, right? They stick up for themselves. They make things happen the way they think things should happen. Yes, that’s the way we usually live our lives. Until, that is, we can’t. And that’s the part that we seem to forget.

I learned a lesson that I’ll not soon forgot while on a long and solitary bike ride across the West. “You’ll be tougher than boiled owl by the time you make it across Wyoming,” the old woman said while ringing up my can of soda and bag of chips somewhere in the middle of nowhere in between Shoshoni and Casper. Yeah, that’s right, I thought, rather enjoying the prospect of being tougher than boiled owl. I’d already pedaled over all of the mountains between there and the Pacific Ocean. And the hundred miles of “rattlesnake country” seemed to be going well so far. How bad could the Great Plains be?

Ah, but it was only a couple of days later that I collapsed – dehydrated, exhausted, and on the verge of heatstroke. And as I recovered my wits in the welcome shade of a highway overpass, vowing to roll out my sleeping bag right then and there if I had to, I realized that what the old woman meant by being “tougher than boiled owl” wasn’t at all about any prideful sense of achievement. It was about learning to abide. You do what you can, and you do what you must, and above all else you learn to abide.

So, when the storms of life rage, when the cold settles in around you and the winds of annihilation howl, remember those rabbits and squirrels and starlings out there, calmly abiding one and all. Sure enough, listen to whatever anger and fear and bewilderment you might be feeling, but just keep breathing all the same. For those feelings are like the wind that roars outside while you’re safe and warm in the burrow of your breath. Breathe in and let it fill you up. Accept its gift with gratitude. Breathe out and trust that another will arrive to sustain you. For you are of this world, and the world still has a place for you. Breathe in and let if fill you up. Breathe out and settle into stillness. The storms of life may rage, but you are alive and calmly abiding.

 

Originally published on Crossing Nebraska in February, 2011.

Edited and updated January, 2019.

Copyright 2011, 2019 by Mark Robert Frank

All images are the property of the author unless otherwise noted.

Are you a student of the mind? That’s not really such a strange question, is it? You have one, of course, and you’re intensely aware of its workings from time to time at least. But do you ever really observe it for the sake of better understanding it, as you might observe the world around you?

Certainly you’ve enjoyed mind’s capacity for single-pointed concentration – while focusing on one of your very favorite tasks, perhaps. You might also appreciate its incredible expansiveness – the way it seems possible to hold all of life and time and space at once within its gentle grasp. Hopefully you can also relate to the stillness of mind that’s possible – the way mind can be as quiet and receptive as an empty nest in winter, patiently waiting for whatever phenomena might “choose” to light within.

Mind has been compared to clear light, luminous and bright, or water, whether cloudy or clear, flowing or still. Mind is referred to as open or closed, gentle or hard, big or small. Yes, mind has been called a lot of things, but not even scientists know with certainty what it is, despite the fact that you can watch it for yourself anytime you wish. Until such time, that is, when mind wanders off with your intention and finds itself lost in a jungle of thoughts that weren’t there in its meadow just a moment ago.

I came to be pondering such things of late (for the umpteenth time) after becoming aware that my mind had shrunk to encapsulate a rather small world that I’d stumbled into. You see, I recently took on the task of leveling the floor in our kitchen and family room – a task that, without getting too lost in the weeds trying to describe it, had no obviously good solution. For weeks I researched methods and considered possibilities. For weeks more I toiled bringing the decided on course of action to a suitable conclusion. And all the while the pressure continued to mount related to the nonnegotiable requirement that the whole project be wrapped up in time for an upcoming family visit over the Thanksgiving holiday.

Mind can constrict around such circumstances and make it seem as though nothing else exists, or ever will exist.

What I was able to notice was that, in addition to its many fine attributes, mind can also be like shrink wrap growing tighter and tighter around us and our less than desirable circumstances as the heat, the pressure of the situation, increases. Our entire world becomes reduced to only that which is contained within our narrowed field of vision. In my case I was able to alleviate that pressure a little bit by reminding myself that I could always use some vacation time to finish up the project, or hire a contractor friend to come in and help if need be. Thankfully, the occasional flash of joyful anticipation of the upcoming family gathering served as the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel as well.

As I write this, however, I’m reminded of times of great loss and hopelessness, when options seemed few or nonexistent, and light seemed nowhere in sight. Mind can constrict around such circumstances and make it seem as though nothing else exists, or ever will exist. It’s important to know how to find stillness in such times. Whether you find it in prayer, meditation, or in communion with nature, the ability to tap into the inherent stillness behind all phenomena can be, quite literally, a lifesaver. A glimpse of stillness can pierce the shrink wrap of constricted mind and transform it into one that is more spacious and open, and patiently waiting for life to nest within it once again.

 

Copyright 2018 by Mark Robert Frank

All images are the property of the author unless otherwise noted.

I suppose some know all too well when they’ve just lived their final summer day. Others can only sift through hazy memories for one that might stand out in retrospect. For me, it was the process of reflecting on the changing of the seasons and the changing of the self that caused this summer walk of not so long ago to become indelibly stamped upon my mind.

It was a day on which the heat and residual fatigue from my morning labor combined to leave me walking the final miles home from my afternoon run. Yet again I’d bitten off more than I could chew! All was well, though. That backroad was quiet in a reassuringly familiar way, with nothing much happening down those lonely miles save for a gentle breeze rustling in the dry brush of a fencerow, or the occasional rasping sound of a grasshopper taking brief flight, or maybe a solitary bird trying to start up a conversation. The stillness invited in me reflection and introspection and, as with so many other end-of-summer days in years gone by, a faint sense of melancholy on account of something beautiful slipping inexorably away.

Autumn then was only a week away, and though a recent spell of cool weather had already put us all on notice, at times it felt as though those summer days might just go on and on. Ah, but I knew that those were silly thoughts. Despite the fact that scant few leaves had yet begun to fall, other not so subtle clues foretold that change would soon be taking place more quickly. The soybean plants and cornstalks had for some time been taking on a hue somewhere between that of the dry earth and the golden sun. Yes, and combines had already begun to crisscross the first of the fields to be planted this past spring, stopping every so often to belch dusty grain into the back of a trailer steered into position.

Life seemed on the verge of passing away; and of course it was and it wasn’t all at the same time. The passing away part, however, was tugging at my heartstrings and making me long to burrow ever deeper into the stillness that I knew was all around me, even as it seemed just out of reach. Was I trying to hang onto life more tightly, or was I simply trying to savor it that much more deeply as it passed? Either way, my efforts left me just this side of stillness, walking the backroads with a longing stretching from one side of the valley to the other, from the upper reaches of the watershed through which I walked to as far downstream as I could see.

As it turned out, though, I would only need to drift downstream for a little over a month in such a state of mind before coming to rest (at least for a little while) in the meditation hall of a Zen temple where I practice from time to time. There, after settling once again into waters still and deep, I could easily recognize where my thinking had gone astray. Actually allowing myself to return to stillness reminded me that “hanging onto life more tightly” and “savoring it that much more deeply” both serve to perpetuate the illusion of our separateness – thereby prompting us to yearn for that which already resides within. We cling to experience for the way it bolsters the experiencer – us. The passing away of life “out there” holds a mirror to the passing away of the self “in here.”

But life is always on the verge of passing away. Life is always on the verge of being born anew. Like a dewdrop condensing on a blade of grass at daybreak only to boil away by midday, we arise and pass away based on what causes and conditions flow and ebb. When I get out of the way and simply watch this as it happens instead of “savoring it that much more deeply,” I can actually be the depth of stillness instead of one who merely longs for the experience of it.

In stillness there is only the beauty of that which is…

A cold front passed over the zendo late that afternoon. Wind rushed through the trees, setting branches to pitching and bending, and leaves to swirling and gusting against the windows. Yes, autumn too was fading, and winter would be coming soon. Light flashed from this direction and that as golden leaves from all around the temple directed the sun to where I sat with eyes barely open. Shadows of my form were cast upon the wall before me. On the left and on the right, and right in front of me – alternating, and in collections of twos and threes – the shadows flashed and disappeared, only to reappear and disappear once more. When things happen, time passes. When nothing happens, there is no time.

In time, the wind died down. The light began to fade, and the wall became a field of gray growing darker. Time and stillness merged until, at last, only stillness remained. It’s a peaceful place. In stillness there is nothing that I am, and nothing to hang onto. In stillness there is nothing that I’m not, and nothing to be savored. In stillness there is no “I” to become melancholy on account of beauty slipping inexorably away. In stillness there is only the beauty of that which is, in all its ever-changing glory.

 

Copyright 2018 by Mark Robert Frank

All images are the property of the author unless otherwise noted.

The county roads in the vicinity of our new home town follow an interesting naming convention. Perhaps in time I’d have figured it out, but I was lucky enough to have been schooled on the matter by a local shortly after my arrival. County Road 325 East, for example, would be one that runs north and south and goes through a point that is approximately 3.25 miles east of the county seat. Exquisitely simple, right? And it makes navigation through the rolling farmland, woods, and riverine bottomlands surprisingly easy – even when you’re unfamiliar with the area. All you need do is get to an intersection of two roads in order to know precisely where you are relative to the municipal center of affairs.

 

Much more difficult, however, is knowing where we’re at in a spiritual sense. Where do we stand with respect to our readiness to meet our maker, the end of our days, or our next major life upheaval? How healthy are our relationships with our fellow humans, or the rest of the natural world for that matter? Where do we stand with respect to the values we hold in highest regard? Our spiritual tradition might provide us with important signposts or benchmarks that we might use in this regard. But getting an accurate reading can be a rather tricky endeavor. For instance, perhaps humility is something that we say that we value. Ah, but as soon as we begin declaring ourselves humble, it’s probably time for us to think again!

Yes, we’re perfect. Yes, we have work to do. There is no contradiction here.

Various spiritual traditions also honor important figures whose demeanor and comportment serve as models for our own behavior. These are usually quite lofty, though, so unless we’re harboring some rigid belief system that preempts reflection on such matters, it would seem that there’s always progress to be made. But how much? How do we know where we stand? Perhaps this is where faith comes in – faith in our path, our practice, our savior, our guide – because it’s simply not as easy as making our way to the nearest intersection.

On the other hand, when we sit quietly and allow our mind to become still – whether we call it meditation, wordless prayer, contemplation, or something else entirely – suddenly there’s no other place that we need be. The world is perfect. We’re perfect. Nothing needs to change. We simply observe all that exists, without identifying with any one thing, or declaring ourselves separate from them. We’ve found our seat.

It’s not that we don’t still have work to do. As long as we’re alive there will be work to do. But a glimpse of perfection imbues our work with newfound joyfulness. Yes, we’re perfect. Yes, we have work to do. There is no contradiction here. This is the realization of both our emptiness and our form. This is the realization of truth from both ultimate and conventional points of view. With the knowledge gleaned from having come to know our seat we can act with greater compassion for all beings.

 

 

Copyright 2018 by Mark Robert Frank

All images are the property of the author unless otherwise noted.

Have you ever really seen spring flowers bloom? Here and there are blossoms fleshy and full, captivatingly beautiful for the benefit of all the world. Others droop with dull fatigue, however, ready to sink into the earth from whence they came. Still others bide their time, holding their petals close, saving up their sap. They’ll have their day tomorrow, and if not, surely the next.

If it were necessary for all of them to bloom at once, then surely they would. But while flowers blooming all at once might be a delight for human eyes, it would bring on catastrophe for the bees and other pollinating insects once the blossoms had all played out. And what if the flowers ended up blooming before the bees ever arrived? That might well sound the death knell for all the flowers as well.

Ryokan said:

When the flower blooms, the butterfly comes;
When the butterfly comes, the flower blooms.

Nature exists in harmony for the benefit of all things, with each thing simply being what it is. This blossom gets more sun each day. That stem had sap rise up within it sooner. Different parts of even the same body have different causes and conditions. And so it is that each blossom opens in its own time – enriching the entire world as it does. The flower and the butterfly continue a conversation that has taken place for millions of years without the utterance of a single word. They are but two parts of a single mind.

Nature exists in harmony for the benefit of all things, with each thing simply being what it is.

Enlightenment and delusion similarly coexist. Some even say that they are one and the same! Delusion sees delusion and calls it enlightenment. Delusion sees enlightenment and calls it just so much delusion. Enlightenment sees enlightenment and enjoys its wondrous blossom. Enlightenment sees delusion and sees a perfect bud that has not yet opened.

What if enlightenment came all at once for all beings here and now? Would it remain that way forever? Could it; or would it exist only for a time like all other conditioned things? And how would the children ever see it bloom after its petals had all dispersed? What if all the world were in delusion not even knowing that a bloom awaits? And yet a bloom awaits, nonetheless. Flowers never cease their activity of creating blossoms, which is why blossoms never cease to exist, even after they’re gone. So it is that enlightenment already exists for all beings here and now.

 

Copyright 2018 by Mark Robert Frank

All images are the property of the author unless otherwise noted.

It seems that most people who speak of friendship rocks these days are referring to smallish stones hand-painted with designs and such intended to be given to somebody special. Yes, the rocks are special too, but it’s the personalized decoration that makes them so. The friendship rocks that I recall from my days spent at summer camp, on the other hand, were already made special by the process of their creation. They were stones which, by some process that I can’t begin to articulate, were formed with holes all the way through them – perfect for stringing with a length of cord and wearing around the neck. Being rare, as they were, made searching for them an endeavor of excitement. And finding one meant that the person sharing in the search was a true friend to be valued.

I was reminded of friendship rocks not long ago when I found one without even trying to in the riverbed not far from our home. My wife and I are blessed to be able stroll the river’s banks from time to time, looking for interesting stones and enjoying the sense of childlike wonder that always visits us as we do. Thankfully, some things don’t change. No matter how old we might get!

Perhaps past, present, and future are all here in this moment – the infinite potential of the pregnant emptiness of now?

That same riverbed is also good for crinoid fossil hunting. Crinoids were plentiful during the Ordovician Period some 450 million years ago. They were ocean dwelling animals that looked in most cases like flowers blooming on raised stalks rooted to the seafloor. Upon their demise, their segmented stalks frequently separated, leaving an abundance of disk-like pieces strewn about which then become trapped in layers of sediment to eventually become fossilized. Interestingly, those disk-like pieces of fossil would one day be strung onto cords and worn as so-called “Indian bead” jewelry. Inspiration for those friendship stones of my youth? Perhaps.

Talk about stones made special by the process of their creation! Is it possible to even fathom the full reality of holding a stone in your hand that contains the bodies of animals that lived 450 million years ago on a warm ocean floor in the very spot that you’re standing? It’s too bizarre to even comprehend. Perhaps the Zen way of looking at time makes much more sense than the way we usually think about it. Perhaps past, present, and future are all here in this moment – the infinite potential of the pregnant emptiness of now?

In case you’re not aware of it already, rock hunting is a meditation of sorts. While not the Zen form that I usually engage in, it has much in common with some others. Rock hunting requires us to keep an archetype in mind of whatever it is that we’re looking for – the object of our meditation – whether it be a rock with a hole in it, a nice flat skipping rock, a fossil of some type, or a nice smooth stone for painting on. With the object of our meditation firmly seated in our awareness, blocking out extraneous mental activity, we scan our world looking for similarity. It’s peaceful to simply be in the world without so much stuff bouncing around in our head. With a little practice, we can enjoy such peace whenever we may choose. The pregnant emptiness of the now is always close at hand!

 

 

Copyright 2018 by Mark Robert Frank

All images are the property of the author unless otherwise noted.