Fire

Traveling isn't supposed to be fun, said an American father to his whining son sitting on a cafe balcony in Istanbul overlooking the Bosporus. It's an adventure.

I used to be someone else but I traded him in.

Begin this day at dawn.

Pashupatinath Hindu cremation ceremony along Bagmati River.

Shiva is the destroyer and creator.

Wood pyres. A woman kisses her shrouded husband goodbye.

Light his fire.

Fire is the beginning and end.

Fire is your rosé flame.

Stir his bones.

His ashes flutter with death and mortality.

Silence. Solemnity. Serenity. Grounded and transient. Flowers. Offerings.

Glorious color dancing fire.

Return to Source.

stir your bones

Ride Mystery every morning. The joy of dirt, red mud, dust. Explore terrain. Essential.

Remember the future.

Today is a burning body in cement block. Orange and yellow and blue.

She made 70. The wat zone, solemn nephew. She had a long life.

Many crypts. Tall trees, heat, fire, add more logs...rising waves of amok below pillars.

Stir bones.

Pedal on in silence. Know the end.

Discover a village inside a village.

Market women find onions, veggies, conversations. I take java. Ice. Shaded trees whisper. Raksa is 14, in the 6th. We bike together on Sunday.

Connections sit in shadows as her sister and mother wash dishes, doing kind and gentle English.

Market zone is a precise poem. The golden thread.

Plasma IV walks down the street with an old man.

Cold

Logical

Detached

Becoming

Begin this day at dawn.

Pashupatinath Hindu cremation ceremony along Bagmati River.

Shiva is the destroyer and creator.

Wood pyres. A woman kisses her shrouded husband goodbye.

Light his fire.

Fire is the beginning and end.

Fire is your rosé flame.

Stir his bones.

His ashes flutter with death and mortality.

Silence. Solemnity. Serenity. Grounded and transient. Flowers. Offerings.

Glorious color dancing fire.

Return to Source. 

To Chiba

Namaste noble warrior of the Zen path,

Your haiku writing is inspirational. 
Farewell little French traveller someone whispered.
The father asks me if I have a (wi-fi) signal. You have three signal children and a beautiful signal wife. 
You don't need an electronic signal. He laughed with this small realization.
 
The crazy anxious German man insists on knowing the cremation cost.
I don't want to die, he said, The water is too dirty.
He needs medicine. He needs to slow down. His energy is a violent fireball. 
It consumes his desire. 
He creates his personal cremation ceremony in public places.
 
In dawn light women inspect orange and yellow flowers.
Men haggle over chickens for the new year sacrifice.
The chariot collided with a wall. Wooden wheels are pinned to stone. Towers shift toward gravity.
Boys play with tower brass bells, women offer fire flowers.
Men discuss future engineering projects.
 
Your Sakura cherry blossom are sublime. 
Seasons bloom with love, beauty.

Metta.

Cremation

Greetings,

The procession of 200 people led by six monks in orange robes followed the rolling wagon carrying the wooden casket inside afternoon's blazing heat along Airport Road. After two kilometers we entered the monastery. A bus of school kids and nuns arrived. 

The casket was carried up the stairs and placed on a metal platform. Her husband led a procession of monks and family members around the tall tapered white and blue building carrying her picture and yellow flowers. They stepped back to allow the team of workers access. They opened the casket so family members could leave something personal inside. 

On a nearby pavilion monks and friends prayed. A man read a final tribute about the woman's life. The family finished expressing their love and men put small logs into the casket. They closed it, rolled it inside and piled more wood around it. They lit the fire and closed the metal door.

People looked up at the top of the tower to four Buddha faces and exhaust pipes. A wisp of black smoke escaped into the clear blue sky, followed by heavier gray and white, now billowing.

People sat in groups talking, drinking water. Everything burned for 2-3 hours. The bones were collected and placed in a family urn and returned to her room. They will be used to create a human figure on banana leaves. In 100 days they will be removed and returned to a family stupa at the monastery.

Metta.