Sunday afternoon.
I give myself a pedi-
cure and take a walk.
Low tide. Sun on the
mudflats. The horizon bright
with the sound of geese.
As Zhuangzi says, this
is also a that. Nothing
compares with the Il-
lumination of
the Obvious. Haiku and
Zen go together.
This would be the time
the foothills of my birthplace
explode in poppies.
A perfectly gray
day. Who can understand it?
Imperceptibly
the ducks float between
cove and cloud. Life is not art.
We wait for spring. We
come to rest in what
we do not know. We quote Chuang
Tzu on wild-card mind.
Radiance of mud-
flats. A man and a boy walk
the edge of the bay.
They stop. The man looks
out over the water, the
boy crouches at his
feet. Sunlight touches
the boy’s red shirt. Desire makes
man, boy, sun equal.
From my sickbed I
listen to the twisting gulls
squeal in shifting winds.
I have seen broken
water shine in April sun
under tiny gulls.
I have come to this
late in life. Call it Stoic,
call it mystical.
On my morning walk
to the dock, the goose couple
we all know was there,
one alert in shade,
the other asleep in the
sun, the head bent back,
lost in bright plumage.
Young, I could see my old wife
and me that happy.
On the icy waves
of a dark spring day, the ducks
are quite voluble.
They stick together
on the broken waves, their words
a comfort like those
a poet overhears
in the poem she writes so
she can write again.
Ah, see, they return,
the village’s children, from
schools far away, dreams
of another life.
The essential summer work
must be done, money
must be made. See them
talk among themselves. Two sit
at the water’s edge,
lean together, be-
fore life can begin, begin
a different life.
Yellow daffodils
brim the cove where the swans swim
together. The light
does not know what it
is or wants, but I stand here
as the day passes.
It’s Easter Monday.
Is what I’m seeking not this
ordinary peace?
It’s Easter, I’m up
early. I visit the geese
as they preen and sun
in the early light.
They are not religious,
I tell myself, mesh
of habit, desire—
flesh of my Flesh. I do love
them for their thick selves.
I pause at the bridge
on the way to the pub. Spring
waters sparkle and roar
into the Bay, surge
at the very place Buson
stood near the floating
world, or so I dream.
It is Easter Saturday
and hell is empty.
Refreshed faces hold
me here, repeat their stories—-
they know I’ll listen.
