Exhaling in Poetry's Shade
A monk in saffron robes sits among the roots of a Bodhi tree. Surrounding him, all manner of flora and fauna complement his sphere of consciousness. The doe licks the monk’s open hands. Wrens adumbrate the monk’s presence. Chipmunks hop about without fear. The sentient animals can feel the glow of the monk’s body, and they seek to share in it. Even the plants phototropize towards his slack. Though carrying harsh thorns, the scrub soften their blades to cradle the touch of his flesh. The monk moves not. His life aggrandizes stillness.
The monk has lived here before, in each of these creatures now embracing the ground. He has been the doe, licking a monk’s palm. He has lived as the hawthorn, relaxing sharp spines at the touch of a tender knee, a knee which now is his knee. The monk has known gravity transcendence, and he has abandoned bird-flight for this, his present form. The monk, through his incarnations as every life surrounding him now, has already proven to himself the worth of this steady concentration under this tree.
The monk knows each one’s name, not because he has chosen names for them, but because their very natures are themselves names, secret names of life in the language of pure Being, a tongue he speaks by his silence. The monk has no thoughts, no beliefs, and no dreams.
He has many talents, but he exercises none of them in this moment. To the animals, fungi, and plants are delegated all tasks. Their self-selected duties maintain these woods. The monk commands them not, nor does he educate them. The monk sits; that is all.
The monk endures rainfall equally with sunlight. Warmth or cold are immaterial to his task. The monk has set his intentions on awakening. The foraging of the insects, the saprotrophy of the moss, the coalescence of the clouds— these concern him only peripherally. The monk will not achieve awakening by aiding or hindering them. The woods perform their work, some sections more skillfully than others. The monk declines to demonstrate to them his value. He could write them prosperous destinies with his knowledge of the all-language. He could share his wisdom with them to hasten their various doings. He could speak to them in their forest tongues to make them happy. He does none of these, though.
The forest persists. The monk has set his vision on Being itself. In Being, he measures out his redemption. In concert with Being he chooses to act. With eyes calmly shut, the monk meditates, night and day.