From the magazine:叮嘱
By Ye Zhou
将一盏灯送进
石窟，也别忘了
带一把青稞。
将一棵菩提
栽上壁画，也别忘了
供一碗净水。
将一尊佛像请进
敦煌，一定别忘了
养一对羔羊。
菩萨不会走。
可万一走了，这些
就是我们疼痛的拌料。
石窟，也别忘了
带一把青稞。
将一棵菩提
栽上壁画，也别忘了
供一碗净水。
将一尊佛像请进
敦煌，一定别忘了
养一对羔羊。
菩萨不会走。
可万一走了，这些
就是我们疼痛的拌料。
Explore Poems: Buddhism
Showing 1-20 of 29
From the magazine:Please
By Ye ZhouTranslated By Wang PingPlease bring a light
Into the grotto cave, please don’t forget
To bring a handful of barley.
Please plant…From the magazine:
Savage, or Thoughts on Reincarnation
By Mandy Moe Pwint TuI want to believe I’m on my last life.
What is nirvana if not a kind of death?
In a past life, a stranger asked the Buddha
for his children. The Buddha offered him his eyes.
Then, pulling the children, screaming,
from the shivering rice...- By John BalabanChased by Chinese troops, the monks
blinked like owls in the sun sheen
abandoning their burning temple
where the obdurate slumped over altars
with bullet-hole Third Eyes oozing
gunpowder and pineal, black blood.
With blizzards choking the high passes
they huddled in the cliff caves
while trusting you... From the magazine:
Inward
By Britney FrancoMy eyes are on yours
Looking for my body in the dark pools of your pupils
And my mind is in a dark suburban town
Where the milkman delivers clanking bottles
To the homes of disenchanted Gen Xers.
You label me an old soul but...From the magazine:
The Wine
By Michael MetivierWhen the townspeople
gave the teenaged Buddha
a glass of wine
so delicious he grew
to an unthinkable size
and froze into a blue statue
that shielded the town
from a wave that broke
upon his back
and would have swept away
the town if he’d not tasted
the wine and...- By David RoderickBasho said to refuse a prayer until its warmth hunches inside like
a bird in its hutch. First the fledgling is born, then the worm, then they
meet somewhere in the grass. I choose my paper for its cereal color, fuss
over shaving... - By Sydney LeaMy objectives this morning were vague.
As always I'd hike these hills—
a way to keep going
against the odds age deals,
a way to keep body and soul
together, and not so much thinking
as letting things steal into mind—
but I started counting
from the very... - By Gary SnyderAt the last turn in the path
“goodbye—”
—bending, bowing,
(moss and a bit of
wild
bird-)
down.Daitoku-ji Monastery - By Kobayashi IssaTranslated By Robert HassAll the time I pray to Buddha
I keep on
killing mosquitoes. - By Gary SnyderO Wave God who broke through me today
Sea Bream
massive pink and silver
cool swimming down with me watching
staying away from the spear
Volcano belly Keeper who lifted this island
for our own beaded bodies adornment
and sprinkles us all... - By Chuang TzuTranslated By Thomas MertonThe non-action of the wise man is not inaction.
It is not studied. It is not shaken by anything.
The sage is quiet because he is not moved,
Not because he wills to be quiet.
Still water is like glass.
You can look in it... - By Marilyn ChinWhy cry over dried flowers?
They’re meant to be straw.
Why cry over miniature roses?
They’re meant to be small.
Why cry over Buddha’s hand citron?
Why cry over the hidden flower?
Why cry over Mother’s burnt forehead?
Her votive deathglow, her finest hour. - By Richard TagettI like to lie with you wordless
on black cloud rooft beach
in late june 5 o’clock tempest
on clump weed bed with sand
fitting your contours like tailor made
and I like to wash my summer brown face
in north cold hudson rapids
with octagon soap
... From the magazine:
Calligraphy Accompanied by the Mood of a Calm but Definitive Sauce
By Dick AllenMake your strokes thus: the horizontal:
as a cloud that slowly drifts across the horizon;
the vertical: as an ancient but strong vine stem;
the dot: a falling rock;
and learn to master the sheep leg, the tiger’s claw,
an apricot kernel, a dewdrop, the...- By Tim DlugosI'm at a double wake
in Springfield, for a childhood
friend and his father
who died years ago. I join
my aunt in the queue of mourners
and walk into a brown study,
a sepia room with books
and magazines. The father's
in a coffin; he looks exhumed,
the... - By Diane di PrimaI saw you in green velvet, wide full sleeves
seated in front of a fireplace, our house
made somehow more gracious, and you said
“There are stars in your hair”— it was truth I
brought down with me
to this sullen and dingy place that... - By Izumi ShikibuTranslated By Jane HirshfieldAlthough the wind
blows terribly here,
the moonlight also leaks
between the roof planks
of this ruined house. - By Garrett HongoAt six I lived for spells:
how a few Hawaiian words could call
up the rain, could hymn like the sea
in the long swirl of chambers
curling in the nautilus of a shell,
how Amida’s ballads of the Buddhaland
in the drone of the priest’s... - By Li BaiTranslated By Sam HamillThe birds have vanished down the sky.
Now the last cloud drains away.
We sit together, the mountain and me,
until only the mountain remains.