There are many kinds of deserts,but they all reject the notion that lifeshould flourish. That’s gravity. A grim background disturbing the atmosphere. But it can’t make you fall in love, or at least that’swhat Einstein said. With an exquisite fussiness, it intones mystical equations and leaks blood in -alabaster basins. Gravity is a creature of two […]
Author: Teahouse
Simulator
At the science museum they have a simulator. This one puts you on the surface of the Moon.It’s fun and unique for an adult. For a 3 year old,it’s a little terrifying. With every bump and shakeof the machine, he holds my shoulders a little tighter. I tell him we are almost done and he says […]
Shortcomings and Spiritual Renewal
In the March of 2017, during a conference trip to Nalanda in India (the old site of this long-lost seat of Buddhist learning is particularly dusty during this time of year), I came down with a terrible hacking cough. I remember my diaphragm aching with each breath I took, even as I felt the overwhelming […]
Master Huijing’s Short Dharma Teachings about Attributes of the Pure Land Sect of Buddhism: Worldly Truths (2)
A passage from the I Ching can be taken as our “mirror” to reflect on the cultivation of morality – Scoundrels shift blame and snatch credit. Ordinary people cover up mistakes and flaunt their achievements. Superior persons decline acclaim and reward for their accomplishments. Those of surpassing virtue share the bitterness and blame from others’ […]
A Good Kiss
A good kiss smells like nectar-filled factories and feels like skin wrapped over a corpse. Erupting from long-patient seeds,it stands still in the mouth, as eyelids movewith the vaporizing speed of a crouching cougarat a midday spring. Shimmering ghostly white. A good kiss is petite, luminous, and stingless.Buzzing like undisturbed bees sipping from the edges covered with pink and emerald beadwork, […]
Stormy Monday
It’s as if a cat is unworthy of grief. After all, there are so many dying children. But some nights I pull into my driveway,still hoping to see him. I look up at the skyand wonder if it will snow. I examine the tracks in the yard. Is he in the landscape anymore?I turn the car off and […]
A Poem Written on the Day Mary Oliver Died
A poem is about being ready tochange your mind. Mary Oliver knew that. Today, Mary Oliver died. And whole morainespale blue with blossoms swept the hillinside. She was one who knew boundaries, and whathonored her own name. Deviating into sensibility, she was one who made honey mesquite with words- so hard scanning the darkness, like a […]
From the Beginning
There is a hushfrom the beginningof time, where youcan hear yourself blink. There is a hush,where a minute agowe were two million milescloser to this cluster thanwe are now. There is a hushwhen we realize how it isthat we belong at the limitof the powers of observation. There is a hushwhen the universe evolvedfrom the […]
The Tech Question Concerns Us All
In a letter dated 6 January to Monsignor Paglia for this month’s 25th anniversary of the Pontifical Academy for Life (which was founded in 1994), Pope Francis noted: “Relying on results obtained from physics, genetics and neuroscience, as well as on increasingly powerful computing capabilities, profound interventions on living organisms are now possible . . . Even […]
Master Huijing’s Short Dharma Teachings about Attributes of the Pure Land School: Worldly Truths
A practitioner should remain quiet about his achievements and flaunt his mistakes. Why? If we reveal our wrongdoings and mistakes to others, our karmic obstructions will be cleared. If we cover them up, the karmic obstructions will become even heavier. If we have reached certain goals or received credit for our accomplishments, we should keep […]