I want to know if you belong — or feel abandoned;
If you know despair
Or can see it in others.

I want to know
If you are prepared to live in the world
With its harsh need to change you;
If you can look back with firm eyes
Saying “this is where I stand.”

I want to know if you know how to melt
Into that fierce heat of living
Falling toward the center of your longing.

I want to know if you are willing
To live day by day
With the consequence of love
And the bitter unwanted passion
Of your sure defeat.

I have been told
In that fierce embrace
Even the gods
Speak of God.

by David Whyte

Now the day is here and boxes are filling and piling by the door. Even after all this time in Brooklyn, so much of my previous life in Philadelphia is still here in boxes, packed away in time. In some ways I can barely recognize it, so much has changed in fifty-two months. Who was that guy who packed it all away?

In the Art Practice guidelines my teacher asked us to pick one object and return to it again and again throughout the ninety-days of the Fall Ango. One week see the object’s stillness, and the the next week experience it’s motion. The object I chose to study was my move. It’s not an object like a bowl of fruit, but it’s “thingness” became clear as it loomed before me.

This week I’m in stillness mode, which is funny since the actual move is happening tomorrow, so I decided to light some incense and to sit a period of zazen before I started packing.

Work on this particular Friday was extrordinarlily stressful, I’d spent most of the day struggling with a small group recalitrant computers at a Times Square tourist trap and it was just after 6PM when I finally admitted defeat. I decided to retreat until Monday.

I emerged onto a surreal street scene. Twilight had come early, and a soft rain cooled the steamy summer streets. Tourists running for cover cleared my way as I strode south on Broadway. The rain had an almost psychedelic effect on the towers of neon against the grey gloaming. I took in the moment as I strolled several blocks to the Yellow Line and a train home to Brooklyn. I caught an R train, leaned back, closed my eyes, and enjoyed the MTA air conditioning against my damp clothing.

Rising up the steps at 4th Ave and Atlantic in Brooklyn, the rain had slowed to a misty summer drizzle. I walked quietly along Atlantic Avenue looking to spot if the next B63 was headed my way. The traffic glistened in the long shadows of sunset as the Muslim call to prayer echoed mystically from loudspeakers hidden in the upper reaches of the Al Farooq Mosque. I don’t know what it is about it, there is an earnest, almost straining quality beneath the smooth haunting verse. It’s quite beautiful, and it calls me to question my preconceptions.

So much of what we think we know about Islam and those who organize their lives according to its ideals is so wrapped up in fear, anger and ignorance that there can be no clear understanding. I just know as I walk through those lilting words bouncing off the brownstones of Boreum Hill I don’t feel fear, nor anger, but wonder.

I don’t understand my own thoughts on the subject, but I’ve tried to educate myself. Karen Armstrong’s book, Islam: A Short History gives us a solid history, and as self-described history buff I was surprised how little I knew. I also enjoyed Fazlur Rahman’s Islam. Both books were written prior to 9/11/2001, but they don’t seem dated as they take a long view of the subject. There are thousands of books on this and related subjects written from every angle imaginable, and the ones I’ve read satisfy me intellectually, but they don’t inform my gut.

I get a definite feeling when I consume media on things Islamic, but it never jives with what I feel when I interact with my Muslim neighbors, and not at all what I feel when I hear the call to prayer here Brooklyn.

<< Audio Clip >> The Muslim Call To Prayer

You okay brother? His street savvy prevails, it’s time to get up. Balance elusive, he half leans on me. I’m good, he keeps saying. You look really good, I joke. You’re feeling good. We laugh. People stream past.

Girl one calls 911. The stairs will kill him, she urges him to sit. Her shrill harshes his buzz. I’m good mami, he assures her. Girl two hovers, receptive, waiting as he gropes to gather his bags. People brush by.

Girl one’s stair fears erupt as he approaches the turnstile. I move to guard the steps. But no metro card. Girl two talks to him, gentle, sweet. Metro card vending is complicated.

Some inner clock clears, determined he pulls it together. Through the turnstile, onrush commuters. Girl two smiles softly thru the bars and disappears.

Down we go. Bump, stumble, sit, slide. Girl one steers, I brake. I’m goooooooood, he says as we all stumble on the last step, relief becomes laughter. Something shifts, the crowd passes three.

Girl one hops the C as an Uptown A arrives, an older woman helps him in. I watch the doors close. Down to the D train and home to Brooklyn.

Grand Street exodus, I move to sit. I spill some coffee, a four inch puddle, Brazilian Roast, two splenda.

Feeling bad I focus on my err, watching as it moves with train rhythm, becoming. Surface tension holds an edge, doing, no intent, no obvious sentience, and then a drop breaks free only to return in response to braking.

Broadway & Lafayette rush to the door, thirty itinerant shoes come and go. Disturbing.

It is customary for the student to offer a small gift of appreciation to the teacher at this time, but what do you give to the man who has everything? It had to be something personal, something with history, something with a story.

Back in the 90’s I began spending vacations in a little town on the western tip of Jamaica. I’d often stay in the same small hotel, and became friendly with the families, restaurateurs, and shopkeepers in the little neighborhood around the hotel. In these years I also began to explore eastern philosophy and to practice various forms of meditation. Mornings in Negril became synonymous with deep introspection peppered with ganja and robust coffee while gazing into the void of the great Caribbean Sea.

Several months after I began to study with Daido Roshi I took a trip to Negril with my Dad. On our first day my friend Elvis called me over to his wood carving stand just outside the hotel’s gate. HIs first questions was, “How are the brothers doing?” It was as if the brothers were old friends who’d emigrated to the States a few years earlier. Actually “The Brothers” were a beautiful pair of crescent moons with expressive Jamaican faces carved from planks of pimento wood. He’s carved them for me as a birthday gift for my daughter. Elvis is a gifted artist with the ability to get right to the heart of the matter.

He held up a block of wood, ironwood he told me, and as he held it he began to ask in a mystical sort of way, “What can I show you in this block? What do you see?” Along with being a wonderful carver Elvis was no slouch as a salesman, but I was in a hurry to get back to my Dad so I blurted out, “Have you ever carved a Buddha?” This got him. He looked at me puzzling images through his mind until a light went on, “The fat one, wit ‘im big belly?” “Not exactly,” I replied and began to speak of the type of Buddha I was referring to. He listened with rapt attention and finally replied, “I’ll look on the internet and we’ll talk tomorrow.”

The next evening Dad and I returned from a day of sightseeing and I stopped by to see Elvis who showed me a catalog of some kind containing several Buddha images. As we looked at them he said, ” ‘im like Rasta men in the mountain praying on Jah Rastafari.” He turned the rough-hewn block in his work worn hands, placed the it on the workbench, and crouching down he began to describe the finished sculpture which he could clearly see. I didn’t interfere, he got it, he got it in a way that filled the whole room. I thanked him, and said I’d see him in a few days.

A few days later Dad left for the states, but I still had a few more days in town, and I was getting worried since I hadn’t seen Elvis all week. On the last morning of the trip I was returning from Millie-the-fruit-lady’s place with some freshly squeezed orange juice when I saw Elvis’ smiling face waving me over.

The statue was wrapped in some kind of oiled cloth and Elvis was rubbing it furiously as if to whet my appetite. When he unveiled it, I was blown away. The statue was so much cooler than I could have ever imagined. Imagination tethered to experience simply limits possibilities, but in this statue Elvis’ world met mine. I paid the first price he mentioned with no attempt to haggle.

I knew that one day I’d donate this treasure to Zen Mountain Monastery, so when the subject of a gift on becoming a student came up, I knew exactly what to do. I was so happy to let go of this unique piece of art that held such strong meaning for me, but with Daidoshi’s illness seeming to be taking hold at the time I went through this process, I never had an opportunity to share what this item actually was.

My next trip to Jamaica was in the Spring of ‘08. I’d hoped Elvis and I could collaborate on another unique carving, but several months earlier he’d stepped on a nail and was having serious health issues. Routine health care isn’t routine in a country as poor as Jamaica. Later that year I became a formal Zen student and I gave the Rastaman Buddha to my teacher.

I didn’t return to Jamaica again till September ‘09 where I found Elvis’ carving stand abandoned. I asked around and was heartbroken to hear that my friend had passed away in the same month I offered his work as a gift. He’d lost his foot to the nail, and weakened by tetanus he succumbed to “flu”, probably pneumonia, a month or so later.

I spent a little time sitting in the dilapidated old carving stand sharing beers with Elvis’ brother who was working to sell off what carvings he could. Sadly in their weathered state they were not appealing to the passing tourists who would never have the honor to know the sweet man I knew as “Elvis The Carver.”

John Daido Loori Roshi 1931-2009

I knew Roshi’s illness had gained ground in recent days, still I was shaken last Friday morning when the dedication of The Heart Sutra was offered to the body of Muge Daido Daiosho.

It was quiet as the service ended. I put on my street clothes, hung my robes in the zendo closet, and walked back into the world. All day my mind was in turmoil. I didn’t know how to react. Should I react in a certain way? Am I supposed to react in a certain way? Is there a Zen way to react?

As the days unfurl I see what others write, I hear what others say, and I wonder where I fit in. Where can my words meet this moment? I see judgments arise that bounce off understandings to form interpretations that may never be fully understood, but here I am.

John Daido Loori, Roshi first entered my consciousness back in 2002 when I read a book called “Waking Up: A week inside a Zen Monastery” by Jack McGuire, and for several years I planned a trip to Zen Mountain Monastery, but I never got there. In 2007 I moved to Brooklyn and began to frequent The Zen Center of New York City, a branch of ZMM. Daido Roshi loomed large my first few months of more serious practice, though I had yet to meet him.

Thanksgiving ‘07 I finally made my way up to the Monastery for the “Introduction to Zen Training Weekend.” I was not prepared for the bigness of what Daido Roshi had created, and I felt I hadn’t given the folks I’d been working with back in Brooklyn their due.

I first met Daido Roshi in a group setting, and I was at once taken by his candor and his gently imposing presence. I don’t know what I expected, but his humor was disarming, his words powerful, yet he held it all effortlessly.

I asked him that weekend, “What does it mean to follow the breath?” He kind of looked me over for a second or two and answered, “Sometimes you’re with the breath; other times you’re not. When you find you’re not with the breath, come back to the breath.”

And that’s what I try to do.

We both have young daughters, mine is twenty-three. He has two, one seventeen another nineteen. I don’t remember them ever playing together. Four year’s age difference, divorces and dislocations on each side, too bad, it would have been cool if they’d been friends.

I’d gotten the bad news from a rickety series of emails and phone calls, last known addresses and parents still living in our old home town. My friend had suddenly lost his oldest daughter. Within hours I found myself speaking to buddies kept in touch with through the most tenuous of connections. We all have kids, none could come close to wrapping our heads around such a loss knowing we would come face to face with it over the next few days. I immediately called my daughter and told her I loved her as a feeling of helplessness enveloped me.

That’s the question. We get used to this or that, the trail clears, widens, and the rut deepens. It may sound apocalyptic but it’s not so dramatic, we do it with everything. Being habitual isn’t the problem, it’s our blind faith in these habits, the non-questioning life.

When a friend and mentor recently made a change, a change to further his practice, a positive change, I felt my clinging to the status quo rear up in my life. Such a simple thing.

I spent several days thinking, “This sucks!” even though I knew intellectually this was a positive move for all involved. “What an asshole I am,” I thought. So conditioned in what I like and what is familiar, it makes one reflect on forests and trees.

It also brings to light just what an expansive journey this life, this questioning life is, and how steep even are the foothills.

Back into the world I find myself selfing
Thinging unreservedly
So I stop

Sitting at my laptop in that coffee chain, connected 
Blackberry, internet, office link, client’s site, dis-connected
So I stop

Why do I feel like I’m wasting time?
Right here in the midst of a whirly-windy work-a-day 
I stop

Take a breath, look around
smile at the old lady sitting next to me
all the time in the world

Everyone seems to know
books overflow my shelves
I keep looking past it
but everyone seems to know

Do it this way
do it that
something tells me it’s not that kind of doing
but what other kind is there?

I never know what to say
people have interest
“you just have to do it”
but it’s not that kind of doing

Sitting
silent inside
my breath
pounding
jackhammer outside
competing

Sitting
jackhammer inside
still
within
please
leave the bell alone

Last week I was on a commuter train, minding my own business, trundling through the back yards of suburban New Jersey. Everywhere I looked were endless tracks of plastic demarcation gleaming in the morning sunshine; ice cliffs calving into a sea of banality, ever new, ever fresh, ever cheerful.

Is my worldview changing? Warped by a few years of introspection, or is it Brooklyn? Am I becoming like those self important Park Slope nose-down-lookers? I’m not quite there yet, but I wonder about those fences. Plastic yard borders surround plastic houses full of plastic things, and even a plastic car on a driveway not yet plastic, though I’m sure teams of plastic scientists are at work right now to remedy the situation.

A banana tastes best as it begins to rot, entropy is what is, yet we deny it. What price for pricey perfection? Standards skewed, Jones’s up-kept, what are we teaching these kids? Causes affecting more causes effect again moving through someone’s idea of bimmers and minivans choking the cul-de-sac.

But it’s OK, these days everyone has GPS to navigate the sameness.

I hope they can find their way…

Aloof, aloft, my mind falls to the technical, the collar of my robe, the proper position of my zafu, adequate bowing space, while others prepare for a service. Catching myself I return to the breath.

Ino announces the service with a name, and a loss. “Did I hear her right?” A feeling, a sorrow, almost a pain grips the pit of my existence, my gut, my hara, their oneness apparent. I try not to react, I let it fill me, I tell myself, ”avoid picking and choosing, just breathe, and let it be.”

Incense is offered for our beloved friend, Sensei’s Poem, his wail. Things seem blurry, my face feels wet. Chanting begins. Awkwardly at first, a dharani new to most of us, but it builds. Louder, deeper, united, it fills the room, maybe it “is” the room. Separations wane, all together, right here, right now.

The bell, the bows, Zazen begins.

Concrete courtyard, silent, bars on windows, doors locked, gates chained, we fight to gain entrance to that place.

Sangha’s face at the door, no longer a barrier, our dirty hands can finally be washed.

Saturday night sit, Zendo all but empty, intimate, complete.

Sunday crowd, knees touching, toe dippers sit wide-eyed; curious, others attempt focus, we stumble gently along the path. 

The clarity and simplicity of Zen Buddhism attracted me. Books by Natalie Goldberg, “Writing Down the Bones” and a few others had become the backbone of my writing practice (daily journal writing in the spirit of Zen). I burned a lot of incense, and I’d spent many hours meditating, but there was never any real structure. I was playing at Zen, curious about the idea of Zen, more correctly, about my idea of Zen. So, about a year ago I decided to dive-in, to take those first steps, and to see what this Zen thing was really all about.

The story below was written in the days after that first experience.

The Zen Center of New York City was a short subway ride away, and before I knew it, there I was, and standing at the huge wooden doors I felt a cool breeze, there were cars and people passing, but there wasn’t the bustle of pre-church hob-knobbing. So often the art of being seen at church is as important as the arts practiced within. There was guy in a t-shirt and jeans sweeping some dead leaves. He didn’t seem to notice me as I took in the moment. I figured he was in some deep Zen trance, and a thrill shot through me as I opened the heavy wooden door.

As I entered a student wearing grey robes welcomed me. “Hi, is this your first time to the temple?” she asked, I guess my yak in the headlights look clued her in. “My name is Heather, welcome.” Her easy smile helped to lessen my edge.

I introduced myself stammering like a jackass. I was nervous, she was cute, and my “monkey mind” was on full display. She directed me upstairs to where I could put my shoes, and then she invited me to join the others in the training room for coffee or tea. She said someone named Karen would be there clue us in on the morning’s schedule.

I walked up the loudly squeaking staircase to the second floor, found the coat room, took off my shoes, but left my socks on. I wasn’t sure if naked feet were cool. What about athlete’s foot? In socks, sweat pants, and an oversized golf shirt, I entered to meet my fellow sangha members.

I don’t know why I was expecting middle aged bald men, maybe it had more to do with how I see my self, but this group was an eclectic mix of Brooklynites. All ages, sexes, and sizes were represented. They were mostly barefoot. Everyone seemed nice, smiling and nodding. Quiet chit-chat murmured in the rear third of the space. There as a refreshment table, some chairs and couches. The front two thirds of the room was a mini zendo complete with a small Buddhist altar and a dozen or so Zabutons (32” X 28” meditation mats), with corresponding Zafus (14” round cushions used for sitting meditation). Otherwise the room looked like any second story living room in a Brooklyn brownstone, hardwood floors, baseboard heating, and walls painted too many times bearing the scars of age.

Karen, also a gray robed student in her mid-twenties, took the half-dozen of us newcomers and explained what we should expect during the service. There was still about ten minutes before we were to go downstairs, so I grabbed a cup of coffee, signed up for the newsletter, put my five dollar “suggested donation” into the blue box and snuck into the coat room to loose the socks.

At nine twenty-five Karen directed us downstairs to find our space in the zendo. My heart was pounding as I creaked down the noisy steps ahead of the others, and I entered a Buddhist Zendo for the first time; barefoot with butterflies. At that moment I realized, after all my reading and study, just how green I truly was. I found a zabuton/zafu/seat on the left side of the room three rows from the back, and I tried to get comfortable looking around to see how others propped themselves up on the little cushions. I put my hands together and tried to be solemn, but trying to be solemn is like trying not to think about a green elephant.

There was a faint incense smell mixed with wood cleaner, the room was dim but not dark with ceiling fans at full blast. Heavy wooden columns and thick paneled walls gave the room character. In the front of the room there stood a small altar, small by catholic standards, with a lovely Buddha carved from some kind of colored stone that gave it an antique look. To the left was a tall thin vase of flowers, two puffy white and mum-like, a hyacinth, and a few twiggy things; very elegant. On the right a heavy beeswax candle like the ones I lit by the hundreds as an altar boy. In the center fore is an incense holder, and in the rear a small vessel of water. Earth, Air, Fire and Water. The basic four elements.

A bell, no, more a chime brought me and the group, the community, the sangha, to focus. With another chime the liturgy began. I felt excitement muted by circumstance as the celebrant began his chants. I had little idea what was going on, but followed along as best I could, bowing, and chanting with the group.

The full bows were unexpected. I’d read about them, but these were my first, and graceful they were not. The full bow begins standing, hands in gassho (a Namaste or traditional prayer gesture) with feet together. Then it’s a bow from the hips, down to the knees, and down further, till the forehead touches the mat with hands to the side of the head, palms up. Then it’s back up. I think we did three such bows. It was then I realized why people were stretching before the service.

Sutra books were handed out to those who needed them, and within moments the group began chanting the Heart Sutra. I was caught off-guard and it took several lines before I caught up with the group. I’d prayed aloud before, I’d sang in church, but I never felt such group cohesion as we all chanted in rhythmic harmony. By the time we were through chanting in both English, and what I assumed was Japanese, though it could have been Sanskrit, the words had somehow penetrated. I still had no idea what was going on, but my feet sank deeper into my zabuton.

At the end of the liturgy part of the program, the newcomers were asked to gather at the back of the hall, and to accompany one of the students upstairs for beginning instruction in zazen. Once upstairs we all took a seat on a zafu and zabuton, and were told a senior monastic would soon be in to talk with us. I looked around at this group of newcomers. A woman in her fifties, who I came in with, was beaming in expectation. A young couple looked terrified, like potheads at Jesus Camp, and a pretty twenty-something girl looked like a little Buddha in full lotus. My knees hurt just sitting next to her.

Me? I was sitting Indian-style (which is now called something more politically correct). I don’t think that was any kind of lotus, but still I tried to straighten up when a man in the black robes of the monastic entered our space. He was an ominous figure, and we were spellbound as he sat before us spending about a minute rolling, folding and configuring his robes so that, when done, he looked symmetric. He addressed us in a gentle voice, and with kind humor.

He spoke of Zen, its history, and its general philosophy. He taught us several different sitting positions. I picked a kneeling/sitting posture called seiza, using the zafu to carry my weight with my feet hanging off the back edge of the zabuton. Then he taught us how to sit: back straight, head forward, eyes in a “gentle gaze” at a forty-five degree down angle, hands together in the cosmic mudra.

Our next step was to go down to the Zendo, find a space, and commit to sitting still for the second thirty five minute period of zazen. Zazen for beginners consists of counting the breath. When distractions arise, see them, let them go, and go back to the breath. He explained how Zazen or sitting meditation is very easy to describe but extremely difficult to do.

“Bring it on!”

I found a space on the far right of the zendo. I situated myself in my seiza position, and it felt good, I even remembered to bow to my seat before sitting. A succession of chimes and clappers began my first real zazen session. There I was, counting my breath and dismissing my thoughts. I was in the zone! “I can do this for hours,” I thought.

Then came the distractions; the mosquito bite on my foot, a truck in the street, motion here, a creak there, I dismissed them and went back to counting my breath. I became aware of every itch, ache and pain, and I began to feel stress, like when you’re on an exercise bike, exhausted, and the timer says you’re only halfway through.

“This is intense,” my mind rebelled, going off in a thousand directions. I fought to stay with my breath, but I wasn’t winning. I sank deeper into my cushion and stuck it out. This was the longest thirty five minutes ever. I began to think of all the ways I’ve lasted thirty five minute in other situations, but then I’d catch myself and go back to my breath.

A chime toned signaling the end of zazen. I unfolded my lifeless legs, and awkwardly began to stand, my bones creaking like the temple stairs. I followed along as we began kinhin (walking meditation). During our instruction the monk said to “just walk,” continue in meditation, and focus on the simple act of walking. The cool marble floor felt good as I walked and stretched. I was in the moment, and as I sat, less formally now, on my cushion I was ready for the next part of the service, the Dharma Talk.

The Zen Teacher gave a talk dissecting a Zen Koan from the ninth century. A Koan is a story or statement, or even a question that defies rational understanding, but can be accessible through intuition. I enjoyed the teaching. He brought the meanings into the present day and familiar situations, even speaking of life in New York City.

When the talk was finished there was more chanting and bowing. I tried to chant along, but really I was just moaning in tune with the group. “I’ll pick this up eventually,” I thought, and for the first time I knew I’d be back.

At the end of the service, everyone dusted off their zabutons, and fluffed their zafus. Some people left, but most went upstairs to the training/refreshment room for more coffee, refreshments and conversation. I spoke to a few of my newbie classmates. The older woman and the little Buddha were jazzed, while the young couple looked less scared, but still a little freaked-out.

I felt great. I felt at peace. I had a sense of accomplishment, and I knew I was at the beginning of something that I really didn’t understand. And that was ok.