After my tongue

After they cut out my tongue I started writing script.

I found a compressed black Chinese ink stick with yellow dragons breathing fire. I added a little water to a grey stone surface and placed the ink in the center.

Then, using my right hand, as Master Liu in Chengdu showed me, I turned the stick in a clockwise motion. Black ink ebbed into liquid as a drop of water rippled a pond.

After collecting ink I picked up my long heavy brown brush. Pure white hair. After soaking it in water for three minutes to relax it’s inner tension I spread out thin delicate paper.

I placed my right foot at an angle, left foot straight, my left palm flat on the table with fingers spread. I dipped the brush in the recessed part of the stone to absorb ink then slowly dragged it along an edge removing excess.

I savored the weight and heft. My brush has it own personality and character.       

There are at least 5,000 characters in my written language. I have much to learn and a long way to travel with this unknowing truth.

I sat up straight, took three deep breaths and exhaled far out into emptiness.

I centered my unconscious on the paper filled with nothing.

My wisdom mind of intent became water. It was quiet, calm and still with concentration and focus.

I listened to brush, ink and paper. I am a conduit.

Be the brush, be the ink, be the water, be the paper.

Each essence is pure, free, clear and luminous.

A Century is Nothing

Through the center

I climbed through the center of Bali inside magical light past an extinct sacred volcano at Lake Batur carrying spare ammunition, a small portable typewriter, a map carved on narwhal bone, a roll of scented four-ply toilet paper, codices or painted books and texts on bark paper called Amate, and cactus fiber including palimpsest animal skins and dialogue of Mayan origin.

My hair caught fire. Gathering flames I lit a piece of bark for guidance.

I mixed volcanic ash with water, creating a thick paste of red ocher, a cosmetic balm rich with antioxidants.

I applied this to my skin to gain entry and passage through the spirit world of ancestors. 

Source: A Century is Nothing.

Hokkaido Fabric

Perfect for each other with no emotional attachment, they jumped in a taxi to Hirosake castle gardens, filled with wide paths, cultivated plants, flowers, 300-year old trees, lotus blossoms in ponds and miles of lilies. 

After crossing wide timber bridges, they passed through large wooden fortress doors into gardens. Ponds near bridges were filled with wild white swans gliding along green banks. A castle sat high above large walls of measured stone blocks with a tiered roof and metal ornamentation.

They walked down a long street to a wooden temple with fresh mythological symbols on archways and roofs. The temple interior contained ornate carvings with sand raked Zen universes. Brown robed monks sat in meditation.

Away from the temple, distant valley mountain peaks were covered in snow. High white gray clouds covered and protected peaks from sky. Fields of rainwater lay in small furrows of well- manicured attendance. Tight blue bundles of feed, grain and potatoes rested as a solemn oath to diligent pastoral life in the mud and meadows of reality.

“Come, I show you fabrics,” Akiko said, grabbing his hand.

The Yukara Ori Museum specialized in hand loom woolen fabrics of Hokkaido. Their brochure read, “When Hokkaido is mentioned, people think of long, severe winters and heavy snowfalls, but when the snow season ends, Hokkaido turns into a colorful world of greenery and flowers.

"An outstanding feature is that our weavings are based on such themes as ‘Ice Floes,’ ‘Lilacs,’ ‘Sweet Briar,’ ‘Lake Mashu’ and ‘Swan,’ drawn from the natural beauty and climate of Hokkaido.

"All of the work is done by hand - from the initial spinning and dyeing of the yarns into hundreds of colors - to the final weaving on the hand loom. It may take years to design and complete a new piece."

Colors ranged from white to black. Themes were ice, villages, cranes, meadows, rivers, mountains, land and sea, and combinations of extremes in clear intimate creations.

A woman at a large handloom gently worked threads creating a growing design. People watched in fascination, until, bored by the simplicity of her Zen, scattered.

She twisted threads into a balanced weight and line before pulling and pressing them into a pattern.

“I know her,” he said to Akiko. “Her name is Little Wing. She weaves old stories into life’s tapestry. I remember a dream she created. Would you like to hear it?”

Source: A Century is Nothing.

Kalapuya

“I speak in tongues, in ancient dialects about love. Dialects of ancestors who lived here for 8,000 years before where you are now. In the forest near the river all animal spirits welcome you with their love. They are manifestations of your being.

“I am blessed to welcome you here. You have walked along many paths of love to reach me.

“My dirt path is narrow and smooth in places, rocky in others. I am the soil under your feet. I feel your weight, your balance - your weakness and your strength. I hear your heart beating as my ancestors pounded their ceremonial drums. I feel the tremendous surging force of your breath extend into my forest. Wind accepts your breath.

“I am everything you see, smell, taste, touch, and hear. I am the oak, the fir and pine trees spreading like dreams upon your outer landscape. I am your inner landscape. I see you stand silent in the forest hearing trees nudge each other. “Look,” they say, “someone has returned.”

“I love the way you absorb the song of brown body thrush collecting moss for a nest. I am the small brown bird saying hello. I am the sweet-throated song you hear without listening. At night two owls sing their distant song and their music fills your ears with mystery and love.

“I am warm spring sun on your face filtered through leaves of time. I am the spider’s web dancing with diamond points of light. I am the rough fragile texture of bark you gently remove before connecting the edge of an axe with wood. You carry me through my forest your flame creates heat of love. I am the taste of pitch on your lips, the odor of forest in your nostrils filling your lungs. It is sweet.

“I am the cold rain and wet snow and hot sun, and four seasons. I am yellow, purple, red, blue, and orange flowers from brown earth.

“Language cannot be separated from who you are and where you live.

“I say this so you will remember everything in this forest. I took care of this place and now your love has the responsibility with respect and dignity and mindfulness.”

Source: A Century is Nothing.

Every August

“Tell us a story,” said kids.

"I’ll do my best,” said a Zen monk. "I heard this story from a friend in The Windy City and it’s stranger than creative nonfiction.

"Funny how it comes around just about this time every year, just like last August. Somebody said August is the cruelest month. Easily the hottest. A local 15-year old girl killed herself yesterday with a single shot to the head. Makes you wonder who, when, where, how and big WHY.

“Last August it was M in old Chi town. The perfusionist. She called a wrong number out of desperation and I inherited the inevitable task of talking her through the drama of her life.

"I answered the phone in Tacoma and kept her on the suicide hot line. It produced basic peace of mind for her. I created poems and a well-done intense piece entitled The Last Several Pages about a book she was reading. She said was going to join a procrastinators club but kept putting it off. She finally settled down with an older divorced real estate salesman.”

"Walking through fires," said Omar, the blind author of A Century is Nothing.

"It was a tough one. All about listening, a lot of listening, recognizing faces of fear, seeing truth. Letting go. Moving on. Finding balance.

"So, another August rolled around again. Out of curiosity I called one of those 900 relationship toll-free numbers and left a message: Independent orphan seeks open-minded spirituality adept woman for casual relationship and friendship.

"Did you get any response?" said Omar.

"Three. The Relationship Express hummed along the tracks stopping at stations named Loneliness, Emptiness, Friendship, mid-life Crisis, Ticking Time Bombs, Endless Conversations, Rhapsody of the Disenchanted, Still Looking After All These Years, and Where’s The One?

"It zoomed past scenic views of Depression, Melancholy, Trust, Hope, Anxiety, Doubt, and Fear as I transited into the listening role with a couple of new women.

"Both from Montana transiting through self- discovery, broken relationships and renewal. We’re riding the range, mending fences, and setting up new parameters. Now I love women, yes sirree, well all right then, but I know better now and it’s just this curious nature of heart and mind to be out there making new connections. I’m not saving anybody.

“All the stations have various levels of becoming. Passengers stuck on levels bang their heads and hearts against transparencies grasping their Gestalt, shattering mirrors and delusions. They work out in private emotional, physical, spiritual fitness centers. Levels replace levels. Each level has a center. The vortex is the equilibrium, the source."

"We are works in progress,” Omar said.

"I’m just doing my work,” I said.

“That’s a powerful statement,” Omar said.

"Yes it is. Now I wouldn’t be the first person to say it’s healing work but I’ve learned to listen.

“Not all the clowns are in the circus. I make it perfectly clear to these kind ladies that I am not in the rescuing business anymore. Nope. No way. Honesty is the best policy and I’m not in the mood to waste their time, my time and our collective energies establishing a Heavy Deep & Real relationship. HDR. The emotional bottom line is they’re looking for a kind, sensitive man who won’t screw around and fuck up their lives. They’ve been cheated on, dumped on and left taking care of the kids. They need someone who will just listen to them without saying, 'I can fix it.' They know what’s what. They know how the world works, how the heart beats. They have their own toolbox. You’ve gotta have a good tool box."

"Tools. Couldn’t agree with you more, " said Omar.

"We’re all passengers on life’s train," said the monk.

It’s the Circus Train!

A fall loon, schools of minnows circle and zoom. I stand in Puget Sound shallows as the Florida circus train rolls north. I yell and wave amid swirling dervishes on granite in rapid ocean tides breathing in and out.

“It’s the circus people.”

“Step right up, under the big Irish bog top!”

People wave from their moving life station. They are the old tired eyed circus veterans standing next to new clowns filming water lap land. They reload memories into instamatics. There are midgets barely able to see over the edge next to sturdy muscular mustached roustabouts. Everything they need in their magic portable city is on rolling stock; water trucks, tents, buses, cages.

There is a bright red ‘For Sale’ sign in a train window. Someone decorated a rolling window with a plant garden spilling into water vapor. Someone displays a stuffed hanging elephant. They are living their dream life on rails. They are caged people living with watered and fed animals.

They have city routines; set it up, do the show with all the temerity of tenacious trainers, take it down, roll mile after mile this gleaming circus waving as the ocean waves a silver fish and one silver sparkles skyward. When they reach the Canadian border they will reverse engines and roll east through Big Sky country toward winterized Florida. Rare dawn light passed sleepy stations, bathed in dew diamonds.

Riding the rails follows our spirit journey.

“The simple way is to listen, stay detached, share and establish levels of responsibility, limitations and boundaries while remaining open to the big picture,” said a monk.

A shadow carrying a candle passed them in the dark.

"Not too much wisdom and not too much compassion," whispered a wandering monk climbing Cold Mountain toward a bamboo cabin sanctuary.

"Who are you?" said a child.

"I am a wandering monk."

"Where are you going?"

"To gather medicinal herbs for tea."

"Would you care to join us later?"

"Yes. We all have (a) ways to go."

"That’s a powerful story. Your friend is onto something there. She touches into what people deal with in their daily lives, their form and their emptiness. It’s not fiction. Or is it? Is it a lie layered with your imagination to make it true?”

"Good question. Omar speaks and writes from the heart-mind. There are people who don’t want to hear this stuff, but say hey kid, they can take it or leave it. I’m willing to take her at her word. It’s about the human condition."

"Well said. Life is something to be lived and not talked about. What say, shall we rest here awhile, enjoy some food, companionship and a siesta?"

Everyone gathered in a sacred circle. It was all light in their interior shamanistic landscape.

Source: A Century is Nothing.