Zen Sense

Two Poems of Ryokan On a quiet evening in my thatched-roof hut,  alone I play a lute with no string.  Its melody enters wind and cloud,   mingles deeply with a flowing stream,  fills out the dark valley,  blows through the vast forest, then disappears.  Other than those who hear emptiness,  who will capture this rare sound?    Ryokan 

(Thanks to Sam Watson for this post)

Here's an awakenening Zen talk from Koun Franz...of Thousand Harbours Zen Center He urges us to see and accept form as our basic approach to being. ^He uses an analogy of Soup . Each ingredient is necessary to the soup and not the same without it. Remove the carrots and it's not the same flavor...Leave nothing out.  *If you want compassion from a room you must bring it with you. *"The form of the practice is the voice of the buddhadharma itself." ....Showing up for every moment matters because each moment matters.  *We are not holding a space; we are being the space, the form . Further, he adds an image of a sangha as a pot of boiling potatoes... tumbling along and rubbing off the skins of some of the others.  Blessings Larry