Writing

vignette by Fred Leeds

There was once a cool musician named Siddhartha, who found a theme that was like a whole new tune, so beautiful that he could hardly bear it. It rang through every hill and dale; it resounded in every other rift and movement; the harmony was everywhere. Nearly hidden by the world’s shout, it echoed still in every passing sound. It was just a matter of sounding the beauty that the world forgot, remembering the audience in your own first note.

This was Siddhartha’s new discovery, which was really as old as it was new. Couldn’t they see? Hadn’t they heard? It came from no other instrument, it held no composer.

Hadn’t they heard?

They heard, all things had heard: His discovery, his thought was the woven embrace of all things. They themselves were the harmony and deeper tune.

vignette by Fred Leeds

A traveler finds himself walking a solitary path; a second man appears on the path before him. A piece of fruit lands on the ground before them. A disappointed bird squawks overhead. The traveler scoops up the windfall, splits it in half, and extends the second half to the other man. “This is so your efforts will not go unrewarded,” says the traveler.

“Your merit too should not be forgotten,” says the other man. He bows as a gift in return. As he reaches out to take the offering, he sees that his hands have become the traveler’s.*

Please tell me, dear reader: Are they one traveler or two?

Here is one possible answer:

Merit is something that should be transferred. This does not mean that merit is first a commodity and is then transferred, but that true merit flows from a humanity which is already shared. Giving is ongoing and has no giver, as our human being is already one gift. There is only one traveler: Buddha, at once taking the form of self and other.

*Adapted from a traditional Zen story. See NO DUCKS: The Koans of Huai-hai (available on the internet).

An Invitation to the Act of Contemplation

vignette by Fred Leeds

When asked about the most abstract truth of Buddhism, Zen folk sometimes tell you to just wash your bowl after you’ve eaten. Is this a relevant answer or not? Our wild, cycling passions – and the grand and anxious questions which veil them – could sometimes just use a quiet container, as food needs a bowl.

Just look at that now-clean bowl: How it gleams! Is it not a symbol of nature’s integrity, before extraneous hungers and doubts have arisen? There is another, more basic kind of hunger, which leads down a corridor to another kind of food. It is here that the appetites and their satisfaction, that doubt and belief, sit down to remember their friendship. For here a world of division is stitched into one, and the soul recovers its nourishment from within. Physical company and food still await in the usual, outer hall, but a soul must first partake of the food of self-reflection, that it might greet that world also as a friend.

A vignette by Fred Leeds

On the wall before me there hangs a beautiful painting, a still life full of bright flowers. It hangs there by itself; the artist’s hand is no longer in sight. All that remains of the artist’s design is the painting itself. The work stands alone, speaking to me with a life all its own.

That is why they call it art.

As with art, so it is with nature. There is a certain cactus that lives in my front yard. It seems to stand alone, but sun, water, soil, time, the whole of nature–all these things are needed for its existence. Nevertheless, we recognize it as something given.

That is why they call it nature.

It is just the same with us human beings. From the midst of our interdependence, we honor each other as independent–and that is why they call it humanity.

A vignette by Fred Leeds

In the old days (before there were clocks and calendars and such), the universe was thought of as a person. Here is a fable, culled successfully from the few records of that time.

The universe woke up one morning and yawned. Glancing about him, he noticed he hadn’t a stitch on. He had grown so weary of having to deal with mechanisms, he could no longer remember things clearly. “Animals and rocks. animals and rocks,” he kept muttering to himself, incoherently. The old fellow had broken off ties with the things that populated him. Every night he pulled down the sun like some casual window-shade, and put it up in the morning only wearily. There was something he had forgotten, something vital to all his plans.

“I can’t keep up with the days anymore and be myself,” the sun moaned to the moon and stars. Having to chase the wearisome, scattered days, our poor shining orb had lost all hope.

Surfacing from its evolution, humanity arrived carrying a treasure called consciousness, which was both old and new. It was a seed the universe had planted in ages past, the promising brainchild he had forgotten.

Clapping his hands, the universe now recalled his own connection to things and people. He returned the sun to its original place of honor in the sky. Seeing the sun restored, the moon and stars danced together as in days past.

Once more the universe looked with favor upon the animals, and he looked indulgently even on the rocks. He smiled for the first time in a very long while: a beam curiously like a human smile, shining everywhere at once.

A vignette by Fred Leeds

Nature’s long cycles lead instantly to the here and now. This is why they call it sacred: because there is nothing apart from the moment of our living experience.

In Zen they call it a miracle that we simply carry water or chop wood. Our everyday practical actions may be symbolic –we must carry water and chop wood again tomorrow — but behind them lies a whole, unfolding universe… Blade and water at once glisten in the track of the disappearing, reappearing figure – a sign of the interconnectedness of all things and our bright source in one another.