Ten Verses on Koans VI

Responses to koans in Gateless Gate -- a.k.a. Wumenguan (Chinese), Mumonkan (Japanese),
Blue Cliff Record -- a.k.a. Biyan Lu (Chinese), Hekiganroku (Japanese), and
Book of Serenity -- a.k.a. Congrong Lu (Chinese), Shoyoroku (Japanese).

Blue Cliff Record 36
"Eventually all things merge into one, and a river runs through it." (Norman Maclean)
By the river, eternal, flowing,
A gate.
At the gate, the conversation, the meeting:
Master and administrator.
oneness and multiplicity,
going and returning,
rising scents and falling flowers,
spring and autumn.

2016 Dec

Book of Serenity 79
Down from the pole of emptiness.
Then down from the pole of ordinariness.
Stepping to one's death over and over,
Ah, that's the life.

2016 Dec

Gateless Gate 11
Two hermits -- what is the difference?
Their sameness is their difference.
Dissolving the illusion of "sameness" and "difference"
Into just this! just fist! just thist.

2017 Jan

Gateless Gate 37, Book of Serenity 47
Down, down go the roots; out, out go the branches --
In the winter, standing bare; in the spring, clad in fresh leaves:
The reason and meaning of all that you ask.

2017 Feb

Blue Cliff Record 2
Snow in the branches, on the roofs. Geese
In the sky. A gibbous moon.
Choosing is not to be found.
Disliking choosing is not to be found.

2017 Feb

Blue Cliff Record 9
Coming in, or going out, or coming out, or going in,
Sunlit, moonlit, or unlit,
Thou and I are always stepping over the threshold of four gates,
As if our names were "The World."

2017 Feb

Blue Cliff Record 30
Soil and tending and the grace of waters
Make a radish.
Conditions and conditions and the whole universe pouring through them --
Make one large radish.

2017 Feb

Blue Cliff Record 41, Book of Serenity 63
After the ecstasy, the laundry.
What is on the other side of death
Was always here on this side
Waiting, like the daylight and the laundry.

2017 Mar

Blue Cliff Record 45
The touch my lover brings, breeze in the pines,
That email to answer, moon rising over a winter lake,
A bowl of oatmeal, the prick of a pin,
The fluttering fall of a red maple leaf,
My friend's sweater, a moment's fear,
The raising and lowering of the teacher's eyebrows,
Flowers among the grass, playground sounds,
And the riverbank talks of the waters of March --
Everywhere, oneness never stops reducing.

2017 Mar

Blue Cliff Record 52
Clop, clop, clop, crossing the bridge,
All us beasts of burden treading on
Always crossing, never crossed,
Or always already crossed, and still crossing
From things to no-things, no-things to things
One step, one stone, one step, one stone.

2017 Mar

Ten Verses on Koans V

Ten Verses on Koans VII

KOAN INDEX