Angelus Silesius (1624–1677), pseudonym of Johannes Scheffler, German poet and priest.
Bashō (1644–1694), pen name of Matsuo Bashō, Japanese poet.
Bashō gave this advice to his disciples: “Go to the pine if you want to learn about the pine, or to the bamboo if you want to learn about the bamboo. And in doing so, you must let go of your subjective preoccupation with yourself. Otherwise you impose yourself on the object and don’t learn. Your poetry arises by itself when you and the object have become one, when you have plunged deep enough into the object to see something like a hidden light glimmering there. However well phrased your poetry may be, if your feeling isn’t natural—if you and the object are separate—then your poetry isn’t true poetry but merely your subiettive counterfeit.”
See A Zen Wave: Bashō’s Haiku and Zen, by Robert Aitken, Weather-hill, 1978.
The Bhagavad Gita (5th?–2nd? century B C E), the central text of the Hindu religion.
“Those who realize true wisdom”: IX.13–34, X.20. In this passage Krishna, the embodiment of the Godhead, is speaking.
See The Geeta, put into English by Shri Purohit Swami, Faber & Faber, 1935, and The Bhagavad Gita, translated by Eknath Easwaran, Nilgiri Press, 1985.
Bibi Hayati (?–1853), Persian mystic and poet; married to the head of one of the Sufi orders, who encouraged her to write down her poems. She also worked as a caretaker and cook for her Sufi brothers and sisters.
Blake, William (1757–1827), English visionary, poet, and artist; considered insane during his lifetime and neglected for nearly a century afterward.
“Men are admitted into Heaven,” Blake wrote, “not because they have curbed & govern’d their Passions or have No Passions, but because they have Cultivated their Understandings.”
See the wonderful contemporary account of him in The Portable Blake, Viking, 1946, pp. 675ff. Henry Crabb Robinson, the diarist, a conventional
Englishman who met Blake several times, with a hilarious mixture of condescension, bafflement, and interest, said that “in the sweetness of his countenance and gentility of his manner he added an indescribable grace to his conversation,” and described an early visit thus: “Everything in the room squalid and indicating poverty, except himself. And there was a natural gentility about him, and an insensibility to the seeming poverty, which quite removed the impression. Besides, his linen was quite clean, his hand white, and his air quite unembarrassed when he begged me to sit down as if he were in a palace.” At one point Blake said to him, “I cannot think of death as more than the going out of one room into another.” Elsewhere Crabb Robinson wrote, “I put the popular question to him, concerning the imputed Divinity of Jesus Christ. He answered: ‘He is the only God’—but then he added—‘And so am I and so are you.’
“The Book of Psalms (8th?–3rd? century B C E).
Psalms 19 and 131 are traditionally ascribed to King David.
Psalm 104: This psalm has such striking affinities to the Hymn to the Aton by the pharaoh Amen-hotep IV (reigned c. 1380—1361 B.C.E.) that it may be considerably older than the above guess.
Bunan (1603–1676), Japanese Zen Master; worked as a gatekeeper until his forties.
Chuang-tzu (369?—286? B C E), Chinese Taoist Master, philosopher, and comedian.
Probably the most famous passage in his book is the following: “Once Chuang-tzu dreamt that he was a butterfly, fluttering around, happy with himself and absolutely carefree. He didn’t know he was Chuang-tzu. Suddenly he woke up: there he was in the flesh, unmistakably Chuang-tzu. But he didn’t know if he was Chuang-tzu who had just dreamt that he was a butterfly, or a butterfly now dreaming that he was Chuang-tzu.”
See The Way of Chuang Tzu, by Thomas Merton, New Directions, 1965, and The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu, translated by Burton Watson, Columbia University Press, 1968.
Dante Alighieri (1265–1321), Italian poet, universally acknowledged, with Homer and Shakespeare, as one of the supreme Western poets. “This mountain of release is such that the”: Purgatorio iv, 88–94. Virgil is speaking.
“The love of God, unutterable and perfect”: Purgatorio xv, 67–75. Virgil is speaking.
“But you who are so happy here, tell me”: Paradiso iii, 64–75,79–87. Dante and Piccarda Donati are speaking.
Dickinson, Emily (1830–1886), American poet. She lived most of her life in her father’s house in Amherst, eventually becoming a recluse and dressing only in white. The extent of her work wasn’t discovered until after her death, when her sister found a small box containing 900 poems collected in packets (gatherings of four, five, or six sheets of folded stationery loosely held together by thread looped through them in the spine, at two points equidistant from the top and bottom). The total eventually came to 1,775. One hundred fifteen of them were first published in 1890, the rest in 1891, 1894, 1896, 1914, 1929, 1935, 1945, and 1955.
Her definition of a true poem: “If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry.”Dōgen Kigen (1200–1253), Japanese Zen Master, philosopher, poet, painter, founder of the Soto Zen school in Japan. His first religious experience occurred when he was seven years old, according to his earliest biographer: “At the loss of his beloved mother, his grief was intense. As he saw the incense-smoke ascending in the Takao temple, he recognized the transitoriness of all things. Thereby the desire for enlightenment was awakened in his heart.” His most important work is the Shobo-genzo (Treasury of the True Dharma Eye), a collection of discourses and sermons in ninety-five fascicles, of which the central discourse is the profound and very beautiful “Genjokoan” (“Realization of the Primary Point”). Two brief excerpts:
To study Buddhism is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be enlightened by all things. To be enlightened by all things is to drop off the mind-body of oneself and others. No trace of enlightenment remains, and this no-trace continues forever.
Enlightenment is like the moon reflected in the water. The moon doesn’t get wet; the water isn’t broken. Although its light is wide and vast, the moon is reflected even in a puddle an inch long. The whole moon and the whole sky are reflected in a dewdrop on the grass.
See Moon in a Dewdrop, edited by Kazuaki Tanahashi, North Point Press, 1985, How to Raise an Ox, by Francis H. Cook, Center Publications, 1978, and The Sound of Valley Streams, by Francis H. Cook, State University of New York Press, 1989.
Francis of Assisi (1182–1226), Italian mystic, founder of the Franciscan order, and the most beloved saint in the Catholic Church. Known especially for his love of poverty and his fondness for animals.
Gensei (1623–1668), Japanese Buddhist monk of the Nichiren sect.
See Grass Hill: Poems and Prose by the Japanese Monk Gensei, translated by Burton Watson, Columbia University Press, 1983.
Ghalib (1797–1869), pen name of Mirza Asadullah Beg Khan, Indian poet of Turkish ancestry. His best poems were written in Urdu and are still widely sung.
See Ghazals of Ghalib, edited by Aijaz Ahmad, Columbia University Press, 1971.
Han-shan (fl. 627–649), Chinese Zen Master, hermit, and poet; his name means “Cold Mountain.” According to tradition, he had a friend named Shih-tê who worked in the kitchen of a nearby Buddhist temple; Han-shan would come to the kitchen for leftovers, and the two friends would eat and laugh uproariously. They are often depicted, laughing together, in Chinese and Japanese paintings.
See Riprap and Cold Mountain Poems, by Gary Snyder, Four Seasons, 1965, and Cold Mountain, translated by Burton Watson, Columbia University Press, 1970.
Herbert, George (1593–1633), English priest and poet.
Hildegard of Bingen (1098–1179), German abbess, visionary, healer, painter, composer, preacher, and social critic.
Hopkins, Gerard Manley (1844–1889), English Roman Catholic priest and poet. His poetry wasn’t published until 1918.
Issa (1763–1827), pen name of Kobayashi Issa, Japanese poet. Issa lost his mother at the age of three and was continually beaten by his stepmother; he later wrote that he “never went to bed without shedding tears.” His later life was marked by poverty, prolonged family conflict, and the death of his first wife and four young children. But somehow he triumphed over all these obstacles and kept his simple, affectionate nature. He is particularly admired for his love of animals and his championing of the underdog.
lzumi, Shikibu (974–1034), court lady, said to be the greatest Japanese woman poet.
See The Ink Dark Moon, translated by Jane Hirshfield with Mariko Aratani, Scnbner’s, 1988.
Jeffers, Robinson (1887–1962), American poet.
Kabir (1440–1518), Indian mystic, poet, weaver, revered by both Hindus and Moslems; “Kabir” means “Great One” in Arabic. According to legend, when Kabir was a boy he recognized the Hindu sage Ramananda as his destined teacher, but knew that a Hindu wouldn’t accept a Moslem as a disciple. He therefore hid on the steps of the Ganges where Ramananda used to bathe; coming down to the water, Ramananda stepped on him and cried out in surprise, “Ram! Ram!” (the name of the divine incarnation that he worshipped); Kabir then said that this constituted an initiation. Touched by his sincerity, Ramananda accepted him as a disciple.
Kabir spent most of his life in a tiny shop in one of the twisting alleyways of Benares. He was illiterate; his poems were passed on orally for generations, and arc still sung by the common people all over India. See The Kabir Book, translated by Robert Bly, Beacon Press, 1977.
Kūkai (774–835), Japanese abbot, scholar, calligrapher, founder of the Shingon (Tantric or Esoteric) school of Buddhism in Japan; also known by his posthumous name, Kōbō Daishi. He was the first Japanese to believe that in essence we are all enlightened and that everyone has the potennal of attaining enlightenment in this very lifetime, regardless of social status, sex, or intelligence.Lao-tzu (571?—? B C E), Chinese Taoist Master, possibly legendary. According to the historian Ssu-ma Ch’ien (145?–89? B.C.E.): “Lao-tzu lived for a long time in the country of Chou, but seeing its decline he departed. When he reached the frontier, the guard said, ‘Since you are going away, Sir, could you write a book to teach me the art of living?’ Thereupon Lao-tzu wrote his book about the Tao, and departed.”
See Tao Te Ching, A New English Version by Stephen Mitchell, Harper & Row, 1988.
Lawrence, D(avid) H(erbert) (1885–1930), English novelist, essayist, and
Lt Po (701–761), Chinese poet. Legend has it that he drowned after drunkenly leaning out of a boat to embrace the moon’s reflection.
Machado, Antonio (1875–1939), Spanish poet and schoolteacher.
See Times Alone: Selected Poems of Antonio Machado, translated by Robert Bly, Wesleyan University Press, 1983.
Mechthild of Magdeburg (1210–1197), German visionary and poet.
When she was twelve, she had a vision in which she saw “all things in God and God in all things.” She joined the Beguine order of lay sisters in 1235, and led a life of charity, nursing, and strict religious exercises. An early Latin translation of her book, The Flowing Light of the God-head,
is said to have inspired Dante, and some critics identify her with the Matilda in Purgatorio, xxviii.
Mirabai (c. 1498–1546), mystic and poet, India’s most famous medieval saint. A Rajput princess, married to the crown prince of Mewar, she refused to immolate herself on her husband’s funeral pyre when he died. She flouted Hindu customs in many other ways; absorbed in her devotion to Krishna, she spent all her time at the temple, singing and dancing before his image, and mingling with the male devotees. Eventually, fed up with her family’s harassment, she became a wandering ascetic. Her songs, like Kabir’s, are still sung by the common people throughout India.
See Mirabai Versions, by Robert Bly, Red Ozier Press, 1980.
The Odes of Solomon (1st or 2nd century), a collection in Syriac discovered in 1909; scholars are unsure whether the original text (perhaps written in Greek) was Jewish with a Christian redaction, or Jewish-Christian, or Gnostic. The poem translated here is Ode 11.
P’ang Yün (c.740–808), Chinese Zen Master, known as Layman Fang. Upon his retirement in middle age, he gave away his house for use as a Buddhist temple, put all his money and possessions onto a boat in a nearby lake, and sank it. “Since his wealth was great,” one ancient account says, “he worried about it. Once he had decided to give it away, he thought to himself, ‘If I give it to other people, they may become as attached to it as I was. It is better to give it to the country of nothingness.’” After this, he and his wife, son, and daughter earned their living by making and selling bamboo utensils.
Layman P’ang’s daughter, Ling-chao, was her father’s equal in depth of insight. Here is one of several dialogues in which she has the upper hand:
The Layman was sitting in his thatched cottage one day. “Difficult, difficult,” he said; “like trying to scatter ten measures of sesame seed all over a tree.” “Easy, easy,” Mrs. P’ang said; “like touching your feet to the ground when you get out of bed.” “Neither difficult nor easy,” Ling-chao said; “on the hundred grass-tips, the great Masters’ meaning.”
See The Recorded Sayings of Layman P’ang, translated by Ruth Fuller Sasaki, Yoshitaka Iriya, and Dana R. Fraser, Weatherhill, 1971, and Original Teachings of Ch’an Buddhism, by Chang Chung-yuan, Pantheon, 1969.
Rilke, Ramer Maria (1875–1926), German-language poet, widely acknowledged as the greatest poet of our century. The central event of his life occurred in 1912, when a voice spoke to him the beginning lines of the great Duino Elegies. Rilke had to wait until 1922 for their completion; in three weeks, caught up in “a hurricane of the spirit,” as if taking dictation, often “in a single breathless obedience,” he wrote down the last five Elegies, the fifty-four Sonnets to Orpheus, and additional poems and prose.
“Be ahead of all parting, as if it already were”: The Sonnets to Orpheus II, 13.
“We are the driving ones”: The Sonnets to Orpheus 1, 22.
“Call me to the one among your moments”: The Sonnets to Orpheus II, 23.
“Silent friend of many distances, feel”: The Sonnets to Orpheus II, 23.
“Rose, O pure contradiction, Joy”: At Rilke’s request, these lines were
carved on his gravestone in the churchyard of Raron, Switzerland.
See The Selected Poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke, edited and translated by
Stephen Mitchell, Random House, 1982, and The Sonnets to Orpheus,
translated by Stephen Mitchell, Simon & Schuster, 1985.
Rumi jelaluddin (1207–1273 ), Sufi mystic and poet, born in what is now Afghanistan; founder of the Mevlevi, the ecstatic dancing order known in the West as the Whirling Dervishes. In 1244 he met the wandering dervish Shams al-Din (“the Sun of Religion”) of Tabriz, an overwhelming experience that led Rumi into the depths of divine love.
Rumi’s habits of composition were described by his beloved disciple Husam: “He never took a pen in hand. He would recite wherever he was: in the dervish college, at the Ilgin hot springs, in the Konya baths, in the vineyards. When he started, I would write, and I often found it hard to keep up with his words. Sometimes he would recite day and night for several days. At other times, he wouldn’t compose for months. Once for a period of two years he didn’t speak any poetry. As each volume was completed, I would read it back to him, so that he could revise it”.
See Open Secret, versions by John Moyne and Coleman Barks, Threshold Books, 1984, Unseen Ram, Quatrains of Rumi, by John Moyne and Coleman Barks, Threshold Books, 1986, We Are Three, New Rumi translations, by Coleman Barks, Maypop Books, 1987, These Branching Moments, translated by John Moyne and Coleman Barks, Copper Beech Press, 1988, This Longing, Poetry, Teaching Stones, and Letters of Rumi, translated by Coleman Barks and John Moyne,
Threshold Books, 1988, and When Grapes Turn to Wine, versions by Robert Bly, Yellow Moon Press, 1986.
Ryōkan (1758–1831), Japanese Zen Master, hermit, calligrapher, and poet; his name means “Goodly Tolerance.” Another Buddhist name that he took for himself means “Great Fool.” Ryōkan is one of the most beloved figures in Japanese literature, and is especially known for his kindness and his love of children and animals; he even used to take the lice out of his robe, sun them on a piece of paper on the veranda, then carefully put them back into his robe. He used to smile continually, and people he visited felt “as if spring had come on a dark winter’s day.” His most famous haiku was written after a thief had broken into his hut and stolen his few simple possessions:
The thief left it behind:
the moon
at my window.
See Ryōkan, Zen Poet-Monk of Japan, translated by Burton Watson, Columbia University Press, 1977, and One Robe, One Bowl: The Zen Poetry of Ryōkan, translated by John Stevens, Weatherhill, 1977.
Seng-ts’an (?–606), Chinese Zen Master, the Third Founding Teacher of Zen. When he first met Hui-k’ê, the Second Founding Teacher, he said, “I beg you, Master, purify me of my sins.” The Master said, “Bring me your sins, and I will purify you.” After a long silence, Seng-ts’an said, “I have searched for my sins, but I can’t find them anywhere.” The Master said, “Then I have purified you.” Upon hearing this, Seng-ts’an was enlightened.
The present version includes about half of the original poem.
Shakespeare, William (1564–1616), English actor, playwright, capitalist, poet.
“Be cheerful, sir”: from The Tempest, IV.i.147–158. Prospero is speaking.
Stevens, Wallace (1879–1955), American lawyer, insurance executive, and poet.
Su Tung-p’o (1036–1101), Chinese civil servant, poet, calligrapher, and painter.
“The roaring waterfall”: This poem was written under unusual circumstances: “At the Temple of the Ascending Dragon there was a famous Zen Master named Chang Tsung. Su Tung-p’o went to him and said, ‘Please teach me the Buddha-Dharma and open up my ignorant eyes.’ The Master, whom he had expected to be the very soul of compassion, began to shout at him. ‘How dare you come here seeking the dead words of men! Why don’t you open your ears to the living words of nature? I can’t talk to someone who knows so much about Zen. Go away!’ Su Tung-p’o staggered out of the room. What had the Master meant? What was the teaching that nature could give and men couldn’t? Totally absorbed in this question, he mounted his horse and rode off. He had lost all sense of direction, so he let the horse find the way home. It led him on a path through the mountains. Suddenly he came upon a waterfall. The sound struck his ears. He understood. So this was what the Master meant! The whole world—and not only this world, but all possible worlds, all the most distant stars, the whole universe—was identical to himself. He got off his horse and bowed deeply, in the direction of the monastery.”
For the complete story, see Dropping Ashes on the Buddha: The Teaching of Zen Master Seung Sahn, compiled and edited by Stephen Mitchell, Grove Press, 1976, p. 131.
Symeon the New Theologian (949–1022), Greek Orthodox abbot, theologian, and poet, born in Paphlagonia (northern Turkey). His discourses, which aimed at leading his monks into a greater awareness of God’s presence within them, stirred up fierce opposition in the local archbishop and among the official theologians, and in 1009 he was exiled to a small town on the Asiatic shore of the Bosphorus, where he spent the rest of his life.
Traherne, Thomas (1637–1674), English priest and poet. The anonymous manuscripts of his Poetical Works and Centuries of Meditation were found in a bin of a London bookshop in 1895. After some skillful literary detective work by the editor and critic Bertram Dobell, the manuscripts were traced to Traherne, an obscure Anglican clergyman. When the poems were published in 1903, and the Centuries in 1908, they caused a literary sensation.
Tu Fu (712–770), civil servant, generally considered the greatest Chinese poet. He supposedly had such confidence in the healing power of his own poetry that he prescribed it for malarial fever.
Tung-shan Liang-chieh (807–869), Chinese Zen Master, founder of the Ts’ao-Tung (Soto) school of Zen.
“If you look for the truth outside yourself”: “Just before leaving Zen Master Yün-yen, Tung-shan asked, ‘After you have died, what should I say if someone wants to know what you were like?’ Yün-yen remained silent for a long time, then said, ‘Just this person.’ Tung-shan was puzzled. Yün-yen said, ‘You must be very careful, since you are carrying this Great Matter.’ Tung-Shan continued to muse about the Master’s words. Later, as he was crossing a stream, he saw his own reflection in the water and suddenly understood what Yün-yen had meant. Thereupon he wrote this poem.”
See The Record of Tung-shan, translated by William F. Powell, University of Hawaii Press, 1986, and Original Teachings of Ch’an Buddhism, by Chang Chung-yuan, Pantheon, 1969.
The Upanishads (8th?—5th? century ICE), along with the Bhagavad Gita, the central texts of the Hindu religion. Traditional Indian scholars date them around 1500 B.C.E.
“The Golden God, the Self, the immortal Swan”: Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, IV.3.12–22.
“Two birds, one of them mortal, the other immortal”: Mundaka Upanishad, III.1.1–2.9.
See The Ten Principal Upanishads, put into English by W. B. Yeats and Shree Purohit Swami, Macmillan, 1937, and The Upanishads, translated by Eknath Easwaran, Nilgiri Press, 1987.
Uvavnuk (mid-19th–early 20th century), a Netsilik Eskimo. She became a shaman in one powerful moment: “One evening she had gone out to pee. It was a dark winter evening, and as she was pulling her pants back on, suddenly a ball of fire appeared in the sky. It hurtled down, directly toward the place where Uvavnuk sat. She wanted to run away, but before she could, the ball of fire hit her and entered her body. All her organs, everything inside her, began to glow. Uvavnuk ran back into the house, half unconscious, and began to sing. Immediately she was delirious with joy, and all the others in the house also were beyond themselves with joy, because their minds were being cleansed of everything that burdened them. They lifted up their arms and let go of all darkness, all suspicion and malice. The song allowed them to blow these forces away as if they were blowing a speck of dust from the palm of their hand. Ever since then, whenever she sings this song, she is able to heal others.” (Adapted from Intellectual Culture of the Iglulik Eskimos, by Knud Rasmussen, Copenhagen, 1929.)
Whitman, Walt (1819–1892), American poet. Whitman’s experience of spiritual awakening probably occurred in June 1853 or 1854 and shines through his first and by far his greatest poem, “Song of Myself.” His deep compassion led him to work with hospitalized soldiers during the Civil War; he wrote letters for them, brought them food and money, fed them, and held their hands while they died.
“Trippers and askers surround me”: “Song of Myself,” 4–5.
“I have said that the soul is not more than the body”: “Song of Myself,” 48–50. (These are conflated texts: I have used primarily the 1855 edition, but a few lines that seemed to me improvements come from later editions.)
Wu-men Hui-k’ai (1183–1260), Chinese Zen Master, author of the famous koan textbook Wu Men Kuan (The Gateless Barrier).
See Zen Comments on the Mumonkan, by Zenkei Shibayama, Harper & Row, 1974, and Gateless Gate, by Kōun Yamada, Center Publications, 1979.
Yeats, W(illiam) B(utler) (1865–1939), Anglo-Irish poet and playwright, generally acknowledged as the greatest English-language poet of the twentieth century.
Yeats’s most powerful statement of spiritual truth occurs in “A Prayer for My Daughter”:
Considering that, all hatred driven hence,
The soul recovers radical innocence
And learns at last that it is self-delighting,
Self-appeasing, self-affrighting,
And that its own sweet will is Heaven’s will.