The Myth Continues...

the 10th and final poem from The Ancient Elm












...samadhi







The final poem is a bit of a 'gimmick', I suppose, but one thing I wanted to communicate in The Ancient Elm is the idea that there isn't a endpoint as is usually the case in 'journey' type works. There is a saying by a Chinese Zen Master that goes something like: "Everything gained in battle is ruined by celebrating." This saying was used in the introduction to Thomas Cleary's translation of Denkoroku to illustrate that achieving satori is not the end goal of Zen, but the beginning.

Too many people, I think, seek satori rather than let it come from within and they end up embracing illusion rather than truth. It's like they are addicted to a drug. Satori is so exciting, that they mistake achieving it for actual enlightenment. I know that I briefly fell into this trap but, thankfully, continued meditation snapped me out of it. So this poem in projecting to the future (how the myth continues), mentions samadhi/meditation. The story never really ends.

Personally, I think the ultimate goal of Zen (if it's even correct to say something like that!) is to live normal life with the same mindset that you have during zazen/meditation: to always be calm and centered and disassociated from illusions, to be in control of yourself and open to life at all times without being swept up in it. I'm a long way from achieving that! But what I've gained from Zen already has made the study of it worth the time. I hope to continue with it.