Mark Nepo's Blog, page 22

The Oldest Conversation

I wonder, will anyone recognize us

without our anger or our fear?

And if we stand here,

softly in the open,

will we be watered

or just mowed down?

Wait. Now that you're here,

tell me about the moon and how

deer dream of running water

and how dogs are simply dogs.

Teach me, before we're tossed back

in, the Sanskrit of your eyes.

The natural, artless, normal

way of putting things together.

The Great Wave

Regardless of what is fair or just in a situation, if we cannot face our pain, we will nurture offenses and cultivate love through being a victim. No matter how skillfully we might do this, relationships will fall away till we are sadly left alone with the pain we won't face.

Sometimes we seek refuge from our pain in the habits of life, as if sheer routine can put our wounds to sleep. But the habits of life can make us all a little squirrelly and soon enough, we don't want our little nest messed with. We don't want anything unexpected or different to disrupt the little box we live in. We don't want anything to unearth the pains we've buried. And just about the time we are most inflexible, some great wave of love or suffering crashes over our little box; humbling us into the unalterable fact that all the little boxes we construct are tiresome illusions. There is only one home, only one nest to which we all belong.

For those of us who survive the great wave, life becomes a seeking out of those who speak the language of the great wave. If blessed, truth and compassion become the ritual by which we greet each other: Did the great wave reach you? Was it kind or harsh? What did it break down or open? What did it give you or take away? What have you chosen to rebuild with? Who did you reach out to? Who showed up? Who ran away? Who keeps muffling the questions? Who wants to know what you see?

Just as there have always been hunters and gatherers, and those concerned with hoarding and those concerned with giving away, there have always been those reduced into Oneness by the great wave of love and suffering and those who run further inland; though this great wave covers the entire earth. Humbly, we are always members of both tribes. As for me, I'm usually the last to know; which is why I need the love and friendship of others; which is why I'm committed to being a loving friend.

Letting Go, a video post by Michele McHall

The Lesson of Winter

It's been cloudy for days. We feel so gray.

The snow keeps falling. But for an hour on

Thursday night the clouds part and the moon,

almost full, makes everything bright—the ice

like diamonds stuck in the gutters, the garbage

can wheels unable to move, happy to be at rest,

the nose of the deer as it nibbles the apple you

tossed for it to find. Our dog's eyes, suddenly

full with her ancient bottom of wolf and her

irrepressible love for everything. Breathing in

the cold, the inside of time is close, like a story

held open till the center of all story shows its

face. And every crest of snow seems blue, yet

nothing is blue. The moon so bright it makes

us look for the sun. The way one honest hand

lifting a particular lie makes us look for truth in

the bottom of history. And the sun keeps spilling

its light off the moon, off us, off our dog whose

breath drops it like silver dust on the snow. Now

the clouds return as if the night is a soft magician

closing its robe. In the days that follow, I am com-

forted to know that the truth of all that keeps us

going is just beyond the closing robe. So powerful

it can spill through a torn heart and light our way.

Wu Wei's Pot

The King asked the Master Potter to shape a pot with a strong foundation and a thin lip from which to drink. Wu Wei had made many in his time. This was a simple request. He asked to watch the King and his chancellors to see how they used such pots. So Wu Wei attended a banquet where he saw the hard use and breakage of rough living. Then he went to work.

He spun the clay on his ancient wheel. But this pot resisted being brought into the world. It would not center. Wu Wei had to hold the clay for a long time before it would yield to his hands. Once trimmed, it had to dry. The King was impatient, wanting something special to show his court. But Wu Wei said that this pot had to be wood-fired for many days in order to tame its shape.

The King didn't understand but left the potter to his secret ways. Not wanting to fire it alone, Wu Wei sat the stubborn pot on a shelf in his shed for months till the other potters had enough. Together, they fired the large sleeping giant that was their kiln. For one week, day and night, the fire was fed constantly and the King's pot waited to be born in the midst of hundreds. Not special in the least.

It took a week for the fire to cool. When opened, many of the pots and urns were warped and brightly flashed. When the King's pot was handed to Wu Wei, it was still warm and the reddest markings made it seem perfect. The lip was thin as flame itself. But the bottom had a crack. Wu Wei was pleased, but tired. He went to sleep.

The next day, he brought the beautifully cracked pot to the King. At once, the King saw the unrepeatable coloring and the utter thinness of the pot's fine lip. Then he felt the crack underneath. He gave it back, "You call yourself a Master? This is not finished!" Wu Wei put it back in the King's hands, "The fire always has the last word, your Highness." The King was insulted and ordered Wu Wei to try again.

Wu Wei bowed and withdrew. On his way from court, a little boy was dumbstruck by the coloring of the pot. Falling to his knees, the little boy could see the sky through the crack in the bottom. Wu Wei helped the boy up and gave him the pot. Overjoyed, the boy ran home and hung the cracked pot from the edge of his roof. Meanwhile, Wu Wei began again.

It took several months but the Master Potter chose another lump of clay, which also resisted being centered. And after stilling it, and shaping it, and fixing its form, after waiting for the others, after stirring the sleeping giant of the kiln once more—another pot was born. This one even more colorful than the last, its lip even thinner. But in the bottom, another huge crack. Wu Wei was doubly pleased as he let it cool.

The next day he brought the second cracked pot to the King who was more eager than before. The King at once was stopped by its beauty. But as he held it, he quickly felt the Godforsaken crack. He smashed the pot and dismissed Wu Wei.

That night, while Wu Wei dreamt of flames cracking the sky, the King dreamt of being a little boy. And as a little boy, he fell in love with cracks and the pots that reveal them. In his dream, the King was startled to see his heart as a cracked pot hung from the edge of a roof. But this cracked heart was his and not his. Somehow it belonged to everyone. And suddenly, those tired of the world were falling on their knees to drink from the rain that was dripping through the crack in the heart that belonged to everyone.

The King woke in tears and rushed to put the smashed pot back together. He couldn't and summoned Wu Wei to make him another. After several months, the Master Potter returned. This time, the King closed his eyes and searched right away for the crack in the bottom and was relieved to find it there.

From that day, the King forbid anyone to call him King and when alone, he drank from his knees; accepting a drop at a time through the crack in his heart.

The One Conversation

In the interviews I've been blessed to have with Oprah, we seem to enter what I would call the "One Conversation," the one ongoing story of how we spend our time on earth. All our lives contribute to this conversation. All our stories contribute to the one ongoing story. Let me share some reflections on where that conversation has been taking me.

I keep returning to the ever-present riddle, that being who we are is the necessary adventure. It unlocks everything, not because our self is so important but because our essential nature that our self carries is the immediate doorway to everything that is life-sustaining. We learn early on that being who we are means fending off unwanted influence without cutting ourselves off from the chance to learn from others. Regardless of the culture we are born into, it isn't long after we arrive that everyone starts pointing and telling us where we need to be and what we need to do to get there. There's no time to really ask why. Soon, things happen and we are thrown off course and now there's all this effort to win their approval, no matter who "they" are. If lucky, love will distract us more than suffering. If blessed, we are broken of everyone's plans and regrets and thrown like a hooded bird into a sea of light. If trusting the fall, we find our wings.

Read the rest of this post.

The Poems

When starting out, I was so excited

that anything showed up, I thought

I was done. But somewhere along

the way, I realized they are alive

and I wasn't wrestling them into

view. They, respecting my effort,

agreed to be seen. Not to be re-

vealed, but to be loved. Now I

circle back in the morning to see

what they need from me. Just more

of my attention which starts with me

undressing what I know. For the

longest time I thought I was revising.

It's more a conversation in which I

keep learning how to listen. And

when I do, they will after a time

pull aside a cloth or cloud to make

obvious the reason they have come.

A Spiritual Problem

When circling what is sacred without touching what is sacred, it's all we can do to find the thread of what matters. Mostly the thread finds us when we least expect: when things are going well and a sadness comes to dinner; when finding a picture of someone you buried long ago and in their eyes is a softness you never knew. Holding what matters at arm's length in order to dissect it seems like a personal problem, and it is, but it's also a spiritual problem that has set human beings at odds with their gifts.

In the beginning, the gods interfered to occupy their endless time on earth until we silenced them, became them. Then it took another thousand years to find the god within. Now it is we who interfere to occupy our limited time on earth, we who pull apart everything we need and poke at everything that is not us, until we fall into the silence that restores what we have known forever but run from: That fame is no reason to do good, and fear, no reason to do bad. Our lungs breathe the sky in every breath. Our heart feels the sea in every feeling. The mind sees beyond itself when it stops insisting it's the thinker. These acts of being have their own continual reward. If we can animate them and let the sky, sea, and all that is beyond us help us and inform us.

There is only one conversation. Each of our lives is a sentence in its story. Loving is the art of putting down our want to be the hero. Listening is the art of threading all the stories. Once threaded the light in all of us is opened. It is the light of all that matters. Drinking of that light brings us back to life.

The Descent

How do we live in a world

where all things are true?

Yet we do. Like a pebble

tossed in the ocean, each

soul dropped into the world

floats slowly, though to us

it seems so fast, while a thou-

sand things come together, tear

apart, prey on each other, grow

from the bottom, leap for the

light, scatter from sudden dis-

turbance. All the while, the

soul drifts lower and we resist

the drift and trouble ourselves

about purpose and where we

are headed and if we're thrown

off course. But there is nothing

more quietly beautiful than a

soul entering the sea of

existence, finding its place

below all the noise.

For the Moment

It was in Vancouver

at breakfast, before my

second cup of coffee.

I had a moment, a long

moment, before the next

task showed its teeth,

before the meetings began,

and the clink of silverware

glistened slightly, and the

coffee warmed my throat,

and I fell into the well of

a silence that was there

before I was born.

For the moment, the

thing that waits behind

my tongue dropped way

down behind my heart,

like an iridescent fish

hovering under all that

water near the center

of the earth.

Now the phone is

ringing. The emails are

flitting, and the voices

in the hive of which I

am a part are mounting.

But the coffee is

steaming and my mind

for now is clear and the

path between it and my

heart is open and I

finally have nothing

to say.