The story has been told and retold: Ben Franklin was walking out of Independence Hall after the Constitutional Convention in 1787, when a lady asked him…. “Well, Doctor, what have we got a republic or a monarchy? Franklin, “A republic, if you can keep it.“ But that’s not the end of the story which most […]
Category: Mind
Seer in the Wilderness
Before dark or star rock or water before the wings of the sky floated over the earth I was called to a calm that mimics stillness but is eternal motion to stillness that mocks death because it wakes in the womb of dawn Because the sun is the eye of an immense bird that flies […]
The Voice
If I spoke from the heart and you could hear You could ride the sound Back to the beginning and see you who you are If I spoke from the heart, my tears would be a river Running to the sea An ocean of sweetest water If I spoke from the heart, my joyful laughter […]
Dreaming The Old Man
Through slanting doors and broken windows odd furniture in dim rooms old books and roses rotting with age I follow you, charts and crumpled maps and paper glitter like a lost hope– Sudden sky and wide water reeds along a shore under a silver willow you call to the other side. No limb or vine […]
What the Smiles of the Buddhas Mean
Smiles east to west? No. Buddhas, temples Flowers, candles, incense Outer symbols of inner realities! The smile from the center of the heart Shines in all directions, outward… The Poem appeared first in “The Fires of Spring” a book of poems by Rayn Roberts 2002
Get a Grip
Easier it is to lift a ten ton boulder on a mountain than to calmly sit and put a collar on an unruly mind. Rayn Roberts 2017
Quasi Koan
When the sun goes down and darkness deepens when candles burn out around a Buddha, is a Buddha still a Buddha if no light reveals a Buddha? Rayn Roberts
Burdens
Two monks returning to a monastery in the evening It had rained Puddles of water had collected on the road At one place a beautiful woman Was unable to cross the road because of a puddle The elder monk lifted and carried her across Leaving her on the other side; then went his way Later […]
What is There?
What is there in the end but forgiveness And forgiving one’s self. What is regret when we cannot go back To change anything? We only move forward To more change, the slow breakdown Of the body, aging and death There is that, of course– The quicker one can do it the better: Live so the […]
Lost
These beasts snapping from all sides just before they ate me alive I sang a tune they fell asleep then dead except for one hatched in my head. I’ll tame it at home– but where is my staff of light where is the map I had in my sack– lost. I like Of Monsters & […]
