My daily activities are not unusual,
I'm just naturally in harmony with them.
Grasping nothing, discarding nothing...
Supernatural power and marvelous activity -
Drawing water and carrying firewood.

- Layman Pang-yun (740-808)







Everything
just as it is,
as it is,
as is.
Flowers in bloom.
Nothing to add.

- Robert Aitken, Roshi, As it Is







Fathomed at last!
Ocean's dried. Void burst.
Without an obstacle in sight,
It's everywhere!

- Joho, 12th Century
Zen Poems of China and Japan, 1973, p. 15
Translated by Lucien Stryk, Takashi Ikemoto and Taigan Takayama







Two come about because of One,
but don't cling to the One either!
So long as the mind does not stir,
the ten thousand things stay blameless;
no blame, no phenomena,
no stirring, no mind.

The viewer disappears along with the scene,
the scene follows the viewer into oblivion,
for scene becomes scene only through the viewer,
viewer becomes viewer because of the scene.

- Seng-ts'an, 600
Hsin-Hsin-Ming: Inscription on Trust in the Mind
Translated by Burton Watson
Found in Entering the Stream, p. 149
Edited by Samuel Bercholz and Sherab Chodzin Kohn





Zen Poems, Verses, Quotes, Quips, Koans - #1.����� .