Entertainment

So, we are on
a very long journey
on spaceship Earth
out into deep space,
and it can be
a boring trip,
so we need
entertainment
to keep us
alive and happy
while we are voyaging,
so Zen people
entertain themselves
by looking at what
is in front of them
and looking at their breath
and stuff like that,
so most people
watch TV and work
and play with computer gadgets,
so I do
my art thing
and my Zen thing
and my Chi Kung thing
for entertainment,
so everybody needs
a thing to do
so that they
can do their thing.

Connections

There are
invisible, wireless,
chi connections
between everybody,
and we aren't really
aware of it,
usually,
but I have become
more aware of it
by interacting
with the computer
Zen sangha,
and I became
aware of it
because we all seem
to be on similar
wavelengths,
like something important
to me
appears in the writings
of someone who knows nothing
about me,
and our feelings
tend to go up
and down
at similar times,
and even our computers
break down at the same time.

Eating Life

So, after I eat,
I always seem
to get depressed,
and probably
it's just
a kind of chemistry
that happens
to most everybody,
but I have
this notion
about eating
food
and that is
that it was once
living beings,
like animals and plants,
so, when I ate
blueberries, tomatoes,
and little fishes
this noon,
I thought of the plants
and the fish
who were something
like Nemo,
whose father couldn't save him,
and I got a little sad,
even though
I said I was sorry
before I ate.

Mystic Or Nut?

So, I am a Zen Buddhist
who also practices
yoga, chi kung and
some sort of shamanism,
but I am also
a mental patient
who takes medicine,
but I was thinking tonight,
"What is this medicine,
but some sort
of drug
that a shaman
would take?",
so I wondered
what my authentic self is,
a nut or a mystic,
and I live
in some dumb suburb
in Michigan, USA,
so how can I be
some sort of mystic,
but you know,
I can't really
figure it out,
but I know
that the two
are stuck together,
so I'm a mystic-nut.

The Wholesome Law

So, there is this story
about a guy named God
who created the entire universe
and had laws
which, if you broke them
you just might go
to a bad place,
so, I have a problem
with believing the Christian story,
but I do believe
in a kind of Universal Law,
which really is a type of common sense law,
or even like the kinds of laws
of science,
so, in Zen
there is this sort of law
to live life
in a wholesome way,
and it's just common sense
that if you live in a wholesome way,
you're liable to live longer,
healthier and maybe even happier,
so it's a good law,
of course, there are
extenuating circumstances,
like if you are not wholesome,
you might know
some sort of secret knowledge
about how to live longer,
healthier and happier,
and if you are wholesome,
you might get hit
by a bus.

My Kind Of Fasting

Ordinarily, when we think of fasting,
we think of going without eating
for a length of time,
but my kind of fasting
is a little different,
as it is the practice
of sitting in a chair,
consuming nothing,
for a length of time,
and that includes
television, radio, internet,
food, drink, smoking, or anything else
which one might consume,
so I do it
for a little while,
sometimes only about five minutes,
or a half of an hour,
or an hour or so,
and I get
a bit drowsy
when I do it,
but after awhile,
I wake up and feel better,
so it's a good cure
for the detrimental effects
of alcohol, food, or any other
sort of problem
that you might have,
so I heartily recommend it.

My Beliefs

I'm a Zen Buddhist,
but I don't necessarily believe
in the Zen Buddhist teaching,
so I believe
in a no death,
but only life
kind of permanence,
that changes
by metamorphosis,
and I believe
that there is a time
for everything,
not just the moral,
good and right,
and I believe
in an authentic self
along with other authentic selves
all living in the one
Great Universe,
and I believe
in sleep,
not just awakeness,
and I believe
in me, my and mine,
just because
society sees it that way,
and I even believe
that bad habits
are not necessarily bad.

Nobody Can Accept How It Is

Nobody can accept
how things are.
That's the problem.
Nobody can accept
how they, themselves are.
That's the problem.
Nobody can accept
the state of the world.
That's the problem.
Nobody can accept
life as it is.
That's the problem.
It's because
of the pain.
The pain is because
we can't be satisfied.
The pain is hunger.
We are all leaning out
and reaching out
for some kind of change.
If the change happens,
we will be leaning out
for some other change.
We constantly want change,
but when it happens,
we don't like it.
We can't accept
things as they are.
I'm trying,
but can't always do it.
I recommend
love and acceptance,
but what do I know?

The Playboy Story

Before puberty,
when I was a little kid,
my father
brought home
a Playboy magazine,
and set it down
on the counter
in the kitchen,
so I saw it,
and my eyes lit up,
so I snuck it out
and took it into the bathroom,
where I locked
the door,
then I began
to look at the pictures
of topless ladies
who got me
as turned on
as could be expected,
when all of a sudden
there was a loud knock
on the door,
and my father shouted,
"I know what you're doing in there...
come out of there, immediately!"
so I opened the door,
and sheepishly handed him
his Playboy,
and, crushed,
joined the family
for dinner.

Zen And The Art Of Thinking

So, Zen has this emphasis
on not thinking,
but Buddha himself said
that nothing will help you more
than thinking,
once mastered,
so, I believe in thinking,
and even about the past
and the future,
because you can work out
your problems with them
and delight in the good stuff,
so, thinking gives you
the most entertaining ideas
and the most inspiring thoughts
that can lead you
to wonderful things,
and these thoughts
are not necessarily true,
they are just
usually good,
for someone
who knows how
to think,
so, I have taken up
thinking practice,
contemplation,
as a Zen practice,
and I think
it's a good idea.

My Muse

My muse tells me
to do something in art
that is simple,
authentic,
quick,
spontaneous,
and easy,
but that is not
the trend in art
currently,
as I see it,
the trend seems to be
to do something in art
that is difficult,
complex,
perfect,
and that takes
a lot of work,
so you see,
I am sort of
out of luck
when it comes
to success
in the art world,
because my way
is not looked upon
as the way to go
for the artist,
but,
as all of us artists know,
we can't go against
our muses.

Back to Zen Again

So, I quit Zen,
for about fifteen hours,
because I got
so mad at it,
but it's an addictive thing,
like religion can be,
so I had
to make some changes
to my practice,
because meditation
stuffs up
my already too stuffed up
head,
and causes it
to get angry,
so now
I am chanting
my mantra,
out loud,
for practice,
and I'm not sitting on my mat and cushion,
I'm standing
or sitting in a chair,
so it seems
to work better,
and even though
I get pissed off
about Zen,
I just can't quit!

By Turning, Turning It Comes Out Wrong

So, tonight
I did a complete turn
on my usual
Zen ideas
of loving all life
and mind is Buddha
and instead
I got honest
and realized
that I don't particularly
like life
and I don't particularly
like the mind,
so I also realized
that I can't stand religion
and this phony teaching
that they tell you,
and so I feel better,
but I'm not supposed to,
because love is supposed to be
the answer,
but maybe it's not,
maybe a little healthy dislike
and a little bah humbug
is what I need,
so I don't know
if I'll keep up
my religion,
because right now
I feel like flushing it
down the toilet.

Daily Practice

When I was young
and learning to play
the piano,
my teacher
suggested
that I practice
every day
for an hour,
but I found
that I couldn't
really do that,
but now
that I am older,
I have found
the wisdom
in daily practice,
and that is to do
just a little bit
every day,
so I do
my Zen practices
every day
for a little while,
and I do
my Art practices
and my Exercise practices
a little bit
every day,
and that
is what turns
a beginner
into a artist
or even a master.

The Hippie Experience And The Zen Experience

When I was young,
I was a hippie
who believed
in love, peace and happiness,
and I had
a little altar
with candles
and incense
and I would meditate
and contemplate
and chant
made-up things,
so later
I got into Zen
and now
I have
a bunch of altars
with candles
and incense
and I meditate
and contemplate
and chant
learned chants
and made-up things,
and I believe
in love, peace and happiness,
but the difference is
that I was stoned
in the old days
and I'm wholesome,
sort of,
now.

This Old Room

I'm sitting in
my old bedroom
which is now
my office
for poetry
and I remember
breaking in
through the window
a long time ago,
and I remember
my friend
burning his hair
accidently
on a candle
and I remember
drinking wine
here
and I remember
smoking dope here,
like the first time
that I got high on it
and I remember
sitting here
with a friend
and a girl friend
and the friend said
"Let's make a movie".

Blimpy And The Hermit

Blimpy and the hermit
lived in houses
that were next to each other,
and Blimpy was a right wing guy
who had lots of guns
and his walls were filled
with the heads of animals
which he had killed,
and the hermit was a left wing guy
who didn't have any guns,
because he practiced
non-violence
and didn't want to harm
anything, even cancer,
if he could help it,
so both Blimpy and the hermit
believed in kindness
and being good neighbors,
but it was Blimpy
who first came over
to the hermit's house
and introduced himself,
and so they became
good friends,
so the moral
of this story
is that you never know
who people really are.

Mental Illness And Spirituality

The mental patient
gets put on drugs
which he or she
doesn't like,
but must be on them
or risk
suicide, hospitalization,
jail, or being
one of those people
who go out
and shoot a bunch
of people,
so you see
how dangerous
it is
to get off of
those drugs,
but the spiritual path
usually teaches
to get off of them
because they say
with their way
you don't need them,
but the spiritual people
don't know
how dangerous
it is for us mental patients,
because
for most of us
these drugs
are a matter
of life and death.

The Dirtyish Way

The way
is the path
of clean living,
but I am in the way
of the dirtyish artist,
and the way
can get dirty,
or gonzo,
or filthy,
or disgusting,
or even evil,
but those ways
are too wrong
for me,
although
I was pretty gonzo
for awhile,
so I am
about ten percentage points
off of
the clean living way,
but I tried
to live
the spiritual way,
and the holy way,
and the monkish way,
and even the saintly way,
but those ways
were all wrong for me,
because I wasn't really good enough,
so I have settled for
the dirtyish way
of the artist,
and that's fine
with me.

The Highest Truth

I arrived
at the Highest Truth
today,
after a difficult lifetime
of searching,
where death
followed me everywhere,
torturing me,
and life was
an bad ocean
of bad beer,
and so this truth
is known
by all the greatest sages
who knew,
because they too
tread this lonely,
treacherous path,
and I followed
the Buddha
because I thought
that he was the One Who Knew,
and so today
I was sitting on the patio
and realized
this Greatest Of Truths
and it was
that I should be
a nice guy.

Torture - A Memorial Day Tale

In Buddhism, there are four stages of mind-development, called jhanas. The first jhana is thinking. The second jhana is not thinking. The third jhana is remembering past lives. The fourth jhana is emptiness.
I have been to all four stages, as, I think, all people have, but we don't know it. The third jhana interested me, from the beginning of my Buddhism, because I thought, "How can I know myself, if I don't know where I came from?".
Memory reveals itself to me, with little video kind of pictures in the mind. If you want to remember what happened a few minutes ago, you look inside and see a little kind of film about what happened. But it is distorted, like a dream, or imagining things, but if it was an occurrence that happened just a few minutes before, it can be pretty clear. However, memories of past lives are not easy as that to believe.
I seem to remember my last life and something about what happened. This is a tale about that.
I was a young man who wanted adventure. I joined the army. It was the Korean War. I was a Christian, but met a Korean woman who I fell in love with. She introduced me to Buddhism. I liked it.
Us soldiers parachuted into the front lines. We came upon a Buddhist temple, and for some reason, the order came down that we couldn't take the monks as prisoners. We had to kill them. So I was facing court martial or killing my fellow Buddhists. I didn't want to face treason, because I refused an order, so we shot the monks.
Later, I was captured by the enemy, and beaten severely in the armpits with the butt of a rifle. I was put in a dark cell. They deprived me of sleep. I was drowned until I almost died, and then they brought me up, and then drowned again, and up again, over and over. I had bamboo shoots shoved up under my fingernails. They gave me ice cream one day, that was filled with maggots which I was forced to eat. They heated up a metal rod to red heat, and burned my genitals. I was completely wrecked.
I think the genital mutilation was more than I could take so I broke and told them what they wanted to know.
Later, I got out, but my own government brought up charges of sedition. While waiting for my court martial and the possible death sentence, I blew my brains out with a pistol, after a last cigarette, and screaming the words, "Help me, Jesus!"
Much of my current life is explainable, knowing or not knowing that this happened.

Enlightenment

Whenever I wonder
if I am enlightened
or not,
I ask myself,
"Well...am I omniscient?",
and the answer
is always,
"No" or
"I don't know, because
I can't even conceive
of such a thing
as a person
being omniscient
and I don't know
what it is"
so I just keep going
with my Zen
like a dummy
who is not enlightened,
and at my temple
we sing a chant
called, "Yebul"
which means
"Homage To Buddhas"
and in the end
of that chant
we say
that we will not become
enlightened
until all beings
become enlightened,
so that's that!

Zen And New Age

My Zen temple
was deciding
quite a few
years ago,
whether to blend
its Zen
with new age teaching,
or stay like pure Zen,
so we all seemed
to have a prejudice
against the new age,
because we thought
that it was too freaky,
so we stayed
with straight Zen,
but I then
sort of left
the temple,
and remembered
that once
I had promised
a woman
that I would read
a Shirley MacClaine book
and I did
and my mind
was freed
from the prison
that one gets into
with fundamentalist religion,
and from there
I have explored much
of new age teaching
and find it
most enlightening,
because, you know,
it's all Buddha!

Life Is Suffering So Hallelujah

In my view,
life is it,
it is the infinite
and eternal,
and Buddha
has been translated
as saying,
"Life is suffering",
but most of us think
that his word
for suffering
was dukha,
which means
"Life seems unsatisfactory",
to me,
so, you know,
it's one thing after another,
one problem after another,
and it gives us
a sickness,
so my new view,
which is not new,
is that dukha is a holy thing,
a kind of grace given to us from life,
because it keeps us going
with hope for something better,
some cure
for the sickness,
and I think the sickness
is not the problem,
it's the solution,
it's life.

Some Of Us Want To Hurt Some Of Us

My computer
recently was hacked
and the hacker
wrecked it.
So, today
I was wondering
why some of us
want to hurt
some of us.
I decided
that we must rub
some of us
the wrong way
and that's why.
So then, I decided
that I was innocent
and hadn't done
anything like that.
Until I thought
about it.
I once threatened
a friend
with a knife
because he wanted
to make me breakfast.
I once threatened
a girl
because she was
flirting with me.
I once blew up
on stage
at a friend
because he wasn't playing
the song
the way I wanted him to.
(and I got booed).
I once shouted
at a friend
because he said
that I was crazy.
(and he was right).

The Perfect Macaroni And Cheese

I don't know
if I remember correctly,
but it seems to me
that one time
in my life
when I was a child,
that I had
some macaroni and cheese
which was perfect.
Ever since then,
I have been trying
all kinds
of macaroni and cheese
and none of them
have quite had it,
like that early memory.
Maybe, it was only
some Platonic ideal
macaroni and cheese,
or some dream
macaroni and cheese.
I tried the box, the can,
the frozen, and the homemade,
but nothing can match
my dream macaroni and cheese.
Zen would say,
"It's all good!",
but I don't know,
I think that at sometime
I once had
perfection.

States

So, we've got
the four,
when we are
fresh spring air,
then warm summer mornings,
then an orange leaf,
then we become
snowflakes,
so why don't we start
the year
on March twenty first,
and then we've got
the three,
where we are air
and water
and earth,
and then we've got
the two
as we are
men and women,
girls and boys,
feminine and masculine,
and we sometimes say
not two,
but some sort
of continuum,
and let's think about
being satisfied
with this.

A Way Out Of Self-Pity

I was full
of self-pity
this morning
and depressed
because I felt
unloved, unappreciated,
and such like that,
so I was bummed out,
and the mind
tried to turn it around
by asking,
"Well...who do you love?"
so I remembered
that when I get really down,
I can only actually bring up
about four people
who I really love,
even though I try
to love everybody and everything,
and then
I thought
that even though
I write to many people,
that I don't connect
very well to anybody
just like they don't connect
with me,
so I thought
of a song
and thought,
"Love Stinks"
and laughed
and felt much better.

Girly Men And Manly Women

I grew up
as a wimpy child,
who had a strong feminine side
and a strong masculine side,
so I was
a girly kid,
and girly boys
get harrassed
by the macho boys,
and the manly girls
get in trouble, too,
but I found out
that after years
of study,
that us girly men
and manly women
have got it right,
and that the macho dudes
and the sexy babes
are out of balance,
so they are the ones
who have gotten it wrong,
so now I am
a happy feng he,
a balance of male and female,
but the big Buddha joke
is that everyone is fine,
because in the final analysis,
we are all something
which you could call
"emptiness".

I Have This Interest In Being Everything

So I got
this interest
in having big lips,
since I have
such thin lips,
so I opened my mouth
and relaxed my mouth,
but I'm not interested
in using Botox,
so I have
this interest
in thinking
that I am a man
with a vagina
and that I am a woman
with a penis,
so I picked up
my rattle
in my left hand
and became
those two people
in the mind,
so I have
this interest
in being everything,
like a me
as a squirrel
walking up
the stairs.

Random Thoughts

So I once slept
with a lesbian
but we just slept,
and art is done
for no reason
other than art,
and Zen meditation
backfires on me
all the time,
and I chant
a bunch of vowel sounds
while holding crystals,
and a Tibetan bell
is on the floor
which hasn't been rung lately,
and my tea
is now cold
since it's meant to be,
and the computer
is sometimes annoying
because it always seems
the same,
and I don't watch TV
because I unplugged
the cable,
and music can bother
someone who thinks
that it talks to them.

Enough Of The Scary Clarity

I have studied Zen
for about forty years
and have found out
that it teaches
the wrong thing
for me,
so I've had it
with the awareness warfare
and the scary clarity
and the cold shower
that shocks the monkey mind
and the sharp tongues,
what I am into
is sitting on a cloud,
no, in a cloud,
and I'm tired
of the bright sunshine
that blinds me
and gives me sunburn,
I want some shade,
I want a fog,
and I am in one
and it makes me happier,
so I don't want
to see things clearly,
I am just going to daydream,
sit around and think
and I won't kick you off
of my cloud,
if you care to join me.

Chemistry

I woke up
today
and was happy
and filled with love
and peace,
and I knew
that my chemistry
had changed
from the day before
when I was
so bummed out,
so I wish
that I knew
a way
to control
my body/mind's chemistry,
with some sort of yoga
or zen
or chi kung thing
or something like that,
but I don't know
of anything
that will do it
and I've tried
many things,
so I guess
I'm at the mercy
of my chemistry,
but that's ok,
I'll survive,
for awhile.

I Live In A Haunted House

This house
that I live in,
which is home
to me,
is very much
haunted
by many ghosts,
who I see
with my internal/external vision
and who
are not too malicious,
since most of them
are sex ghosts,
and a few of them
are like Casper
the friendly ghost,
but there is one
in the guest room
who I have gathered
is some sort
of daughter of the Devil,
who gets held there
by the other ghosts,
and when I go
in that room,
she flies up
to the ceiling
and poops
all over me.

Today

This morning,
I woke up
to a spiritual war
with Mara
or somebody
or other,
and it bummed
me out,
so I decided,
enough
with my spiritual junk,
and to sit around
and comtemplate matters,
and so I decided
that spiritual junk
is not going
to cure
a busted brain
like I have,
and instead,
it will probably make
matters worse,
so I'm still
doing a little bit
just for insurance,
but have thought
about it,
and figure
to say
screw it.

Computer Pornography

So, the wise
and not-so-wise
advise
against looking
at pornography,
but I see
nothing wrong
with looking
as long as
you don't get
sucked into it,
so, I like
to take a quick look,
because it is
such a potent drug
that I see things,
interesting things,
after looking,
and I usually look at
heterosexual stuff,
which is cool,
and I would suggest a glance
at homosexual stuff,
in order to deal
with any possible
homophobia,
and they have everything
on this computer deal,
so let's get free
and enjoy ourselves!

Blessings And Curses

When I was a little kid,
my mother taught me
how to pray,
and I did,
so I decided
to bless
my family
and everybody else
in the world,
and the funny thing is
that the blessings
did happen,
because the family
suffered terribly
and had an awful time
in life,
I just didn't know
that was what a blessing is,
because it is taught
that being blessed by God
is something like getting rich
and happy,
but today
because of an understanding
of Jesus' Sermon On The Mount,
I understand
that the real blessing
is painful suffering
and that it is a curse
to be rich.

Time Stopped

When I was young,
I wrote in an empty frame of mind
that time had stopped,
and I wondered about this
for years,
like about what I meant
by that,
and now,
I have a hunch
that I get it,
and that is
that time has never existed,
and that all there is here
is space
with objects that are moving and changing,
so there is only this eternal moment
of now,
with no past
and no future
only a big eternal now,
and I figure
that we are deluded about this,
because it is really hard
to think this way,
so I guess
time has stopped,
so think about it
if you want to.

Muddy Enlightenment

I have a kind of enlightenment
which is not clear
and which I am not too confident about,
and it is
the kind of enlightenment
where one sees the emptiness
of all things,
but without the clarity
and confidence
of a Buddha,
so it's a muddy enlightenment,
where I say that it's
like this,
but then I say
that it's sort of like this,
and often I say
I don't know,
but that's just because
nobody knows
if they really consider
what it is,
so the enlightenment
which I have struggled
so long and hard for,
is a sloppy, muddy enlightenment
where sometimes
I just throw up my hands
and say "Fuck It!".

Cutting It Up And Putting It Together

A long time ago,
I asked myself,
"Who am I?"
and I found
that I couldn't answer
that question
to my satisfaction,
so that question
has been traveling
through the mind
for years and years,
and along the way,
I learned that Buddha said
that there is no self,
but that puzzled me
and I didn't understand it,
because I thought
that there was something
which I could call my self,
so the Zen master
taught that there was something
which could be called
the authentic self,
even though
it is non-existent,
so I have put it together
and now I can safely say
that this is me
sitting here,
period,
and I'm scratching my nose.

The Cat Pisses On The Roof

So, the Zen master
was giving a Dharma talk
about the mind,
and he said,
"The cat pisses on the roof...
you see, it's authentic"
so, the mind
in this body thought,
"What's that mean?"
and it wondered
if he was just talking
about a cat pissing
on a roof
or if he was talking
about some archetypal being
thinking in my head,
or some cat pissing thoughts
in my brains,
or some black jazz musician
playing music
in my head,
so later I figured that
the cat did
piss on the roof,
like just an ordinary cat,
but that it also
probably means
all this junk,
but anyway,
the cat pisses on the roof.

Being Sixty

This is not
how I thought
being sixty
would be,
I thought
I would be
an old guy
with a lot of experience
and an old mind,
but, instead,
I find
that I am a kid
just out of high school
inside,
and nothing
has really happened,
so, I have
some sort of brain
that's like a fourteen year old,
but, when the Beatles sang
when I'm sixty-four,
I thought
that was an ancient age,
so, go figure,

I got fooled again.

Click Below For Music - Permanence - http://www.hypedsound.com/music/songs.php?action=listen&id=28174

http://www.hypedsound.com/music/songs.php?action=listen&id=28174