Poetry Feature:
'Only the Dead': Vietnam

The Daily Lotus:
Selected Buddhist Devotionals

To be a warrior in the Buddhist sense
is to walk without armor.
-- Sakyong Mipham

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Spontaneous Playground

[. . .]
I am a horseman.
And when I ride, I think simply of movement.
The animal that lies below me I could not love any more
Than this hard earth which allows me to be.
I am a rider
When I plan my simple life.
I know I will be able to enjoy
The fresh milk of spring,
The cold and poignant snow of winter.
The delightful message
That all this must end when autumn arrives.
Every moment, every moment of my being,
Is the season of spring.
Wild horses jump inside my heart
When I think of the ones I love.
Wild horses roam in my vast, uncharted belly
When I do not know what will happen to me.

I am a horseman,
And I live to move across the earth
In a simple and dignified manner.
I do not ask if pine trees always remain
I do not ask if flowers blossom unconditionally
I do not ask if, in future generations,
The milk of my precious mares will be sweet.
I only ask that I remain in the gentle harmony
In which I feel both delight and ever-present bewilderment.

~ .

Single Fortress

In the vast palace of loneliness
We all preside.
Walls are white, clean, and strong.
An overwhelming familiarity pervades the space.
As we walk,
Move through space.
It is both cumbersome and full of delight.
I revel in its pristine luminosity;
I try to escape its walls of whiteness---
In a life here our own predestined predictability
Is commanded by our simple voice,
But constantly doubted in turmoil.

O whiteness,
O loneliness,
We have become dismantled fortresses.
We have become alone in our love.
Let us make love to our aloneness.

~ .

Time is Short

Let's talk about directness
Let's talk about saying what we see.
Let's talk about feeling movement when it happens.
Let's talk about the sudden rise of energy
When we know something is right.
What is this blueness that holds our heart?
What is it to twirl, hold, hug and play
In a soft milky cloud that tingles?
What is the experience of stripping the very skin off bamboos?
What is it to gaze directly, fully,
And shall we say spiritually,
Into the heavens
And old the moon, mesmerized by its glow?
Is this the play of directness?
Is saying what we think real directness.
Or is saying what we do not think directness?
Is saying what we think in fact indirectness.
And is saying what we don't think directness?
Joy comes when we see a yak
Dancing in the highland meadows.
Power comes when we see a mountain,
Full of its heritage,
Displaying all its wonder.
In this world, where uncertainty seems to dominate the space,
Let us at least say certainly that we don't know what certainty is.
Be heavy and walk light.
Smile and have a heavy heart.
Be open and always know that time is short.

~ .

Jump and Be Joyous

Dancing
To dance
Dance between the dances
dance between what is dancing.
Let us dance
Let us look up
Let us dance
Let us look up and inhale
Let us dance
Let us be
Let us delight
Your hand in mine,
Creating a crevice which our fate depends upon:
Your fate and mine--we can play and be joyous
Your fate and mine are ordinary to many.
Your fate, my fate
Mine and yours
The jump of life
The jump of a tiger's whiskers.
Let me lick my tongue
Let me feel my tongue upon the sun.
Upon the ground,
Upon the sky.

Ki Ki! You are magnanimous
You are the inheritor of the earth
You are going to make us proud.
[ . . . ]

Born in Tibet, Sakyong Mipham is the son of Chogyam Trungpa, founder of Naropa University and the Shambhala centers throughout the world. With his father, a respected and beloved teacher of Kagyu Buddhism, he belongs to the Mukpo clan.