Those are the simplest and the best words I ever wrote.

I used to try so diligently to build the proper "frame" for these words---to write a longer, more specifically thematic poem to showcase them. I wasted a lot of paper, ink, and brain cells. Everything I "tacked onto" these words was irrelevant, clunky.

Then one day, I stopped messing with them. Whew.

All I had to do was let go.

That's what we need to do with our lives--not just our words.

How many of our activities and opinions are merely "tacked on", unnecessary to the essence of who we are? How many days of our lives are as clean, as purposeful, as classic haiku?

Reciting scriptures...

Strange the wondrous blue I find

In morning-glories.

KYOROKU

In my dark winter

Lying ill ... at last I ask

How fares my neighbor?

BASHO

Dewdrop, let me cleanse

In your brief sweet waters ...

These dark hands of life

BASHO

If you enjoyed these, you should get a copy of A Little Treasury of Haiku, from Avenel Books, 1980, which features excellent translation by Peter Beilenson, and from which I have just quoted (WITHOUT any commercial or plagiaristic intent.) Two of the best haiku writers were Basho (1644-1694) and Issa (1763-1827.) You can find their works in various translations.

For a wonderful Tao/Zen links page, check out my wife the White Rabbit.
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