.
Not everything is beautiful (little "b") in our little village, not at all.
Adjacent to Treeleaf and the old temple is an old dump, ugly and dangerous. With our human eye, we see it as ugly and something to fix. We should clean it up, make it better.
With a Buddha's Eye, we encounter even the ugly as Beautiful (Big "B"), Shining, Nothing Lacking and Nothing to Fix.
Likewise for all the ugly or scary things of life, all of which can be encountered with both Eyes open at once.
With both Eyes open, let's clean it up, even though it shines as a jewel.
Our Sangha member Hobun wrote a poem which captured the point better than anything I could say ...
Ugly
I have great compassion for junk,
For the objects that are ugly
Through no fault of their own:
On its bent rim, the gashed tire
Bleeds tiny threads of steel;
Undulating strips of tin
Cross themselves with jagged ends;
The deep-fridge, its lid arrested in rising,
Touches the scuffed desk
Piled with diapers;
Roaches, rat shit, razors,
Chairs with broken backs and legs,
Shining needles straight as pine,
All these oddities and endings,
I absolve your ugliness;
There are hands and eyes enough to blame
That fashioned you and broke you
And brought you here and keep you,
But I absolve your ugliness.
In sunshine, in moonlight,
In dew, in frost, in rust and rot.
I hold you in your beauty.
Eyes of my eyes, let us be
Open together.
Not everything is beautiful (little "b") in our little village, not at all.
Adjacent to Treeleaf and the old temple is an old dump, ugly and dangerous. With our human eye, we see it as ugly and something to fix. We should clean it up, make it better.
With a Buddha's Eye, we encounter even the ugly as Beautiful (Big "B"), Shining, Nothing Lacking and Nothing to Fix.
Likewise for all the ugly or scary things of life, all of which can be encountered with both Eyes open at once.
With both Eyes open, let's clean it up, even though it shines as a jewel.
Our Sangha member Hobun wrote a poem which captured the point better than anything I could say ...
Ugly
I have great compassion for junk,
For the objects that are ugly
Through no fault of their own:
On its bent rim, the gashed tire
Bleeds tiny threads of steel;
Undulating strips of tin
Cross themselves with jagged ends;
The deep-fridge, its lid arrested in rising,
Touches the scuffed desk
Piled with diapers;
Roaches, rat shit, razors,
Chairs with broken backs and legs,
Shining needles straight as pine,
All these oddities and endings,
I absolve your ugliness;
There are hands and eyes enough to blame
That fashioned you and broke you
And brought you here and keep you,
But I absolve your ugliness.
In sunshine, in moonlight,
In dew, in frost, in rust and rot.
I hold you in your beauty.
Eyes of my eyes, let us be
Open together.
)
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