QUESTION AND ANSWER AMONG THE MOUNTAINS

The Peach Blossom Spring 



You ask me why I dwell in the green mountain;
I smile and make no reply for my heart is free of care.
As the peach blossom flows downstream
and is gone into the unknown,
I have a world apart that is not among men.

Li-Po
701-762

Translated from the Chinese
by Robert Kotewall and Norman L. Smith

MOUNTAIN TEMPLE

Bhuddist Temple in the Mountains
11th century
Ink on Silk

I have locked the gate on a thousand peaks

To live here with clouds and birds.

All day I watch the hills

As clear winds fill the bamboo door,

A supper of pine flowers,

Monk's robes of chestnut dye -

What dream does the world hold

To lure me from these dark slopes?

Zekkai

translated from the Chinese by Burton Watson

ON TRUST IN HIS HEART

The Perfect Way is only difficult for those who pick and choose;

Do not like, do not dislike, all will then be clear.

Make a hairbreadth difference, and Heaven and Earth are set apart;

If you want the truth to stand clear before you, never be for or against.

The struggle between 'for' and 'against' is the mind's worst disease;

While the deep meaning is misunderstood, it is useless to meditate on Rest.

It is blank and featureless as space; it has no 'too little' or 'too much';

Only because we take and reject does it seem to us not to be so.

Do not chase after Entanglements as though they were real things,

Do not try to drive pain away by pretending that it is not real;

Pain, if you seek serenity in Oneness, will vanish of its own accord.

Stop all movement in order to get rest, and rest will itself be restless;

Linger over either extreme, and Oneness is forever lost.

Those who cannot attain to Oneness in either case will fail:

To banish Reality is to sink deeper into the Real;

Allegiance to the Void implies denial of its voidness.

The more you talk about It, the more you think about It, the further from It you go;

Stop talking, stop thinking, and there is nothing you will not understand.

Return to the Root and you will find the Meaning;

Pursue the Light and you will lose its source,

Look inward, and in a flash you will conquer the Apparent and the Void.

For the whirligigs of Apparent and Void all come from mistaken views;

There is no need to seek Truth; only stop having views.

TAKAKUSU XLVIII

translated from the Chinese by Arthur Whaley