{"id":335,"date":"2022-11-14T23:22:19","date_gmt":"2022-11-14T23:22:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/curatedlines.online\/?p=335"},"modified":"2022-11-14T23:22:19","modified_gmt":"2022-11-14T23:22:19","slug":"zen-reflexions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/curatedlines.online\/index.php\/2022\/11\/14\/zen-reflexions\/","title":{"rendered":"Zen Reflexions"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<pre class=\"wp-block-verse\">To discern \n           our place \nTo commune \nTo see \n           beyond our close shadow of death \nTo focus \n           my poet mind \nI need direction \n           a qibla \nOr some beads to tell \n           to take refuge from my life: \nA candle flame \nOnly the candle \nFlame \nFlickering \nA journey into quietude \n            begins \nInto that silence \n             comes tranquillity \nAnd the absence of words \nSerenity beyond words: \n              I become sentient - \n              conscious of only this moment in the flame of a grain of sand \n                           <em>Of the sun shining through golden autumn trees <\/em>\n                          <em>Of the clearing mists <\/em>\n                          <em>dissolving in the valley and above the hills <\/em>\n                          <em>giving way to rain that fills the sky <\/em>\n                         <em>so that the branches droop, dripping <\/em>\n                         <em>as the wind rustles the upper boughs <\/em>\n                         <em>and drops spatter on the window glass. <\/em>\n                        <em>Of love <\/em>\nPeace \nPerhaps, now, I am no longer physical \n              But have become a spiritual being \n              having a human experience \nWriting \n              And in the writing \n                                the words return<\/pre>\n\n\n\n<p>Originally published in <em><a href=\"https:\/\/curatedlines.online\/index.php\/books\/\">Mostly Welsh<\/a><\/em> (Y Lolfa 2019, pp.51-52)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Notes<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Moliere: &#8220;Without knowledge life is no more than a shadow of death&#8221;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>qibla: Spiritual direction\u00a0 (the direction of Mecca)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Zen Master, Hung Chih, writes of serene reflection in which one forgets all words and realizes &#8211; is aware only of &#8211; Essence.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>c.f.<\/em> Blake: Auguries of Innocence: &#8220;To see a World in a Grain of Sand&#8230;&#8221;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>&#8220;We are not human beings having a spiritual experience, but&#8230;&#8221; Generally attributed to Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, SJ, a French idealist philosopher and Jesuit priest<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>To discern our place To commune To see beyond our close shadow of death To focus my poet mind I need direction a qibla Or some beads to tell to take refuge from my life: A candle flame Only the candle Flame Flickering A journey into quietude begins Into that silence comes tranquillity And the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[19,32,18],"class_list":["post-335","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry","tag-chris-armstrong","tag-mostly-welsh","tag-poem"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/curatedlines.online\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/curatedlines.online\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/curatedlines.online\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/curatedlines.online\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/curatedlines.online\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=335"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/curatedlines.online\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":337,"href":"https:\/\/curatedlines.online\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335\/revisions\/337"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/curatedlines.online\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=335"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/curatedlines.online\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=335"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/curatedlines.online\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=335"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}