Chants and Poems

Before you know what kindness really is

you must lose things,

feel the future dissolve in a moment

like salt in a weakened broth.

What you held in your hand,

what you counted and carefully saved,

all this must go so you know

how desolate the landscape can be

between the regions of kindness.

How you ride and ride

thinking the bus will never stop,

the passengers eating maize and chicken

will stare out the window forever.

Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness

you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho

lies dead by the side of the road.

You must see how this could be you,

how he too was someone

who journeyed through the night with plans

and the simple breath that kept him alive.

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,

you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.

You must wake up with sorrow.

You must speak to it till your voice

catches the thread of all sorrows

and you see the size of the cloth.

Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,

only kindness that ties your shoes

and sends you out into the day to gaze at bread,

only kindness that raises its head

from the crowd of the world to say

It is I you have been looking for,

and then goes with you everywhere

like a shadow or a friend.

From Words Under the Words: Selected Poems. Copyright © 1995 by Naomi Shihab Nye.

Interbeing

The sun has entered me.

The sun has entered me together with the cloud and the river.

I myself have entered the river,

and I have entered the sun

with the cloud and the river.

There has not been a moment

when we do not interpenetrate.

But before the sun entered me,

the sun was in me—

also the cloud and the river.

Before I entered the river,

I was already in it.

There has not been a moment

when we have not inter-been.

Therefore you know

that as long as you continue to breathe,

I continue to be in you.

Published in Thich Nhat Hanh, Call Me by My True Names (1993)

ODE TO GRATITUDE

Gracias to the word

that thanks.

Thanks to gracias

because

this word

melts snow or iron.

The world seemed threatening

until soft

like a clear

pen,

sweet as a sugar petal,

from lip to lip

it occurs,

gracias,

large in a full mouth

to whisperers,

barely murmured,

and being was worth being a person

and not a window,

some clarity

entered the forest,

it was possible to sing it beneath the leaves.

Gracias, you’re the pill

against

the sharp oxides of contempt,

the light against the altar of hardness.

Perhaps

you are also

the tapestry

between the most distant people.

The passengers

are spread

in nature

and then

in the jungle

of the unknown,

merci,

while the train frantically

changes countries,

erases borders,

spasivo,

next to the pointed

volcanoes, cold and fire,

thanks, yes, gracias, and then

the earth is transformed into a table,

a word cleans it,

plates and cups shine,

the forks rattle

and the plains look like tablecloths.

Thanks, gracias,

that you travel and return,

come up here

and go down there.

It is understood

that you don’t

fill it all up,

word of gracias,

but

where your little petal

emerges,

the daggers of pride are hidden away,

and a cent’s worth of a smile appears.

ODA A LAS GRACIAS

Gracias a la palabra

que agradece.

gracias a gracias

poer

cuanto esta palabra

derrite nieve o hierro.

El mondo parecía amenazante

hasta que suave

como pluma

clara,

o dulce como petalo de azucar,

de labio en labio

pasa,

gracias,

grandes a plena boca

o susurantes,

apenas murmulladas,

y el ser volvio a ser hombre

y no ventana,

alguna claridad

entro en el bosque:

fue possible cantar bajo las hojas.

Gracias, eres la piladora

contra

los oxidos cortantes del desprecio,

la luz el altar de la Dureza.

Tal vez

tambien tapiz

lentre los mas distantes hombres

fuiste.

Los pasajeras

se diseminaron

en la naturaleza

y entonces

en la selva

de los desconocidos,

merci,

mientras el tren frenetico

cambia de patria.

Spasivo,

junto a los puntiagudos

volcanes, frio y fuego,

thanks, si, gracias, y entonces

se transforma la tierra en una mesa:

una palabra la limpio,

brillan platos y copas,

suenan los tenedores

y parecen manteles las llanuras.

Gracias, gracias,

que viajes y que vuelvas,

que sabas

y que bajes.

Esta entendido, no

la llenas toda,

palabra gracias,

pero

donde aparece

tu petalo pequena

se esconden los punales del argulla,

y aparece un centavo de sonrisa.

TRAVELER

Traveler, your footsteps are

The road, and nothing more.

Traveler, there isn’t any road,

The road is made by walking.

By walking you make the road,

And when you turn to look behind you

You see the path that never

Can be taken again.

Traveler, there isn’t any road

Just a wake in the sea.

CAMINANTE

Caminante son tus huellas

el camino y nada más

Caminante, no hay camino

se hace camino al andar.

Al andar se hace camino

Y al volver la vista atrás

Se ve la senda que nunca

Se ha de volver a pisar.

Caminante no hay camino

sino estelas en la mar…

RR translation. Revised 2023

The people I love the best

jump into work head first

without dallying in the shallows

and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.

They seem to become natives of that element,

the black sleek heads of seals

bouncing like half-submerged balls.

I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,

who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,

who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,

who do what has to be done, again and again.

I want to be with people who submerge

in the task, who go into the fields to harvest

and work in a row and pass the bags along,

who are not parlor generals and field deserters

but move in a common rhythm

when the food must come in or the fire be put out.

The work of the world is common as mud.

Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.

But the thing worth doing well done

has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.

Greek amphoras for wine or oil,

Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums

but you know they were made to be used.

The pitcher cries for water to carry

and a person for work that is real.

From Circles on the Water: Selected Poems of Marge Piercy

(Alfred A. Knopf, 1982).

Love the quick profit, the annual raise,

    vacation with pay. Want more

    of everything ready-made. Be afraid

    to know your neighbors and to die.

    And you will have a window in your head.

    Not even your future will be a mystery

    any more. Your mind will be punched in a card

    and shut away in a little drawer.

    When they want you to buy something

    they will call you. When they want you

    to die for profit they will let you know.

    So, friends, every day do something

    that won’t compute. Love the Lord.

    Love the world. Work for nothing.

    Take all that you have and be poor.

    Love someone who does not deserve it.

    Denounce the government and embrace

    the flag. Hope to live in that free

    republic for which it stands.

    Give your approval to all you cannot

    understand. Praise ignorance, for what man

    has not encountered he has not destroyed.

    Ask the questions that have no answers.

    Invest in the millennium. Plant sequoias.

    Say that your main crop is the forest

    that you did not plant,

    that you will not live to harvest.

    Say that the leaves are harvested

    when they have rotted into the mold.

    Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.

    Put your faith in the two inches of humus

    that will build under the trees

    every thousand years.

    Listen to carrion – put your ear

    close, and hear the faint chattering

    of the songs that are to come.

    Expect the end of the world. Laugh.

    Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful

    though you have considered all the facts.

    So long as women do not go cheap

    for power, please women more than men.

    Ask yourself: Will this satisfy

    a woman satisfied to bear a child?

    Will this disturb the sleep

    of a woman near to giving birth?

    Go with your love to the fields.

    Lie down in the shade. Rest your head

    in her lap. Swear allegiance

    to what is nighest your thoughts.

    As soon as the generals and the politicos

    can predict the motions of your mind,

    lose it. Leave it as a sign

    to mark the false trail, the way

    you didn’t go. Be like the fox

    who makes more tracks than necessary,

    some in the wrong direction.

    Practice resurrection.

from The Country of Marriage, 1973, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc. © by owner. 

GRAVITY'S LAW

How surely gravity’s law,

strong as an ocean current,

takes hold of even the smallest thing

and pulls it toward the heart of the world.

Each thing-

each stone, blossom, child-

is held in place.

Only we, in our arrogance,

push out beyond what we each belong to

for some empty freedom.

If we surrendered

to earth’s intelligence

 we could rise up rooted, like trees.

Instead we entangle ourselves

in knots of our own making

and struggle, lonely and confused.

So, like children, we begin again

to learn from the things,

because they are in God’s heart;

they have never left him.

This is what the things can teach us:

to fall,

patiently to trust our heaviness.

Even a bird has to do that

before he can fly.

WENN ETWAS MIR VOM FENSTER FÄLT

Wenn etwas mir vom Fenster fällt

(und wenn es auch das Kleinste wäre)

wie stürzt sich das Gesetz der Schwere

gewaltig wie ein Wind vom Meere

auf jeden Ball und jede Beere

und trägt sie in den Kern der Welt.

Ein jedes Ding ist überwacht

von einer flugbereiten Güte

wie jeder Stein und jede Blüte

und jedes kleine Kind bei Nacht.

Nur wir, in unsrer Hoffahrt, drängen

aus einigen Zusammenhängen

in einer Freiheit leeren Raum,

statt, klugen Kräften hingegeben,

uns aufzuheben wie ein Baum.

Statt in die weitesten Geleise

sich still und willig einzureihn,

verknüpft man sich auf manche Weise, -

und wer sich ausschließt jedem Kreise,

ist jetzt so namenlos allein.

Da muss er lernen von den Dingen,

anfangen wieder wie ein Kind,

weil sie, die Gott am Herzen hingen,

nicht von ihm fortgegangen sind.

Eins muss er wieder können: fallen,

geduldig in der Schwere ruhn,

der sich vermaß, den Vögeln allen

im Fliegen es zuvorzutun.

(Denn auch die Engel fliegen nicht mehr.

Schweren Vögeln gleichen die Seraphim,

welche um ihn sitzen und sinnen;

Trümmern von Vögeln, Pinguinen

gleichen sie, wie sie verkümmern...)

This being human is a guest house.

Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,

some momentary awareness comes

as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!

Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,

who violently sweep your house

empty of its furniture,

still, treat each guest honorably.

He may be clearing you out

for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,

meet them at the door laughing,

and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,

because each has been sent

as a guide from beyond.

from Rumi: Selected Poems, trans Coleman Barks with John Moynce, A. J. Arberry, Reynold Nicholson (Penguin Books, 2004)

Turning and turning in the widening gyre   

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere   

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction, while the worst   

Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;

Surely the Second Coming is at hand.   

The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out   

When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi

Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert   

A shape with lion body and the head of a man,   

A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,   

Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it   

Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.   

The darkness drops again; but now I know   

That twenty centuries of stony sleep

Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,   

And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,   

Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

When you are lost in your own life.

When the landscape you have known falls away

When your familiar path becomes foreign

and you find yourself a stranger

in the story you had held most dear.

Then let yourself be lost.

Let yourself leave for a place

whose contours you do not already know,

whose cadences you have not learned by heart.

Let yourself land on a threshold

that mirrors the mystery of your own bewildered soul.

It will come as a surprise,

what arrives to welcome you through the door,

making a place for you at the table

and calling you by your name.

No one but me by the fire,

my hands burning

red in the palms while

the night wind carries

everything away outside.

All this petty worry

while the great cloak

of the sky grows dark

and intense

round every living thing.

What is precious

inside us does not

care to be known

by the mind

in ways that diminish

its presence.

What we strive for

in perfection

is not what turns us

into the lit angel

we desire,

what disturbs

and then nourishes

has everything

we need.

What we hate

in ourselves

is what we cannot know

in ourselves but

what is true to the pattern

does not need

to be explained.

Inside everyone

is a great shout of joy

waiting to be born.

Even with the summer

so far off

I feel it grown in me

now and ready

to arrive in the world.

All those years

listening to those

who had

nothing to say.

All those years

forgetting

how everything

has its own voice

to make

itself heard.

All those years

forgetting

how easily

you can belong

to everything

simply by listening.

And the slow

difficulty

of remembering

how everything

is born from

an opposite

and miraculous

otherness.

Silence and winter

has led me to that

otherness.

So let this winter

of listening

be enough

for the new life

I must call my own.

from The House of Belonging. © Many Rivers Press, 1997

I open myself

to breathing naturally

through the moments

of my life and

with each breath

enterin gentle

awareness presence

I am ready

to inhale naturally

and to experience

the depths of

welcoming and

engaging with

all aspects of life

I am ready 

to exhale naturally

and to experience

the depths of

letting go and

of allowing life

to flow

I am ready 

to discover how

I tighten my body

when I breathe

and resist my

own experience

of present reality

I open myself

to breathing naturally

through the moments

of my life and

with each breath

entering gentle

awareness presence

from Zen Prayers for Reparing[sic] Your Life by Tai Sheridan

When great trees fall,

rocks on distant hills shudder,

lions hunker down

in tall grasses,

and even elephants

lumber after safety.

When great trees fall

in forests,

small things recoil into silence,

their senses

eroded beyond fear.

When great souls die,

the air around us becomes

light, rare, sterile.

We breathe, briefly.

Our eyes, briefly,

see with

a hurtful clarity.

Our memory, suddenly sharpened,

examines,

gnaws on kind words

unsaid,

promised walks

never taken.

Great souls die and

our reality, bound to

them, takes leave of us.

Our souls,

dependent upon their

nurture,

now shrink, wizened.

Our minds, formed

and informed by their

radiance,

fall away.

We are not so much maddened

as reduced to the unutterable ignorance

of dark, cold

caves.

And when great souls die,

after a period peace blooms,

slowly and always

irregularly. Spaces fill

with a kind of

soothing electric vibration.

Our senses, restored, never

to be the same, whisper to us.

They existed. They existed.

We can be. Be and be

better. For they existed.

i   

Make a place to sit down.   

Sit down. Be quiet.   

You must depend upon   

affection, reading, knowledge,   

skill—more of each   

than you have—inspiration,   

work, growing older, patience,   

for patience joins time   

to eternity. Any readers   

who like your poems,   

doubt their judgment.   

ii   

Breathe with unconditional breath   

the unconditioned air.   

Shun electric wire.   

Communicate slowly. Live   

a three-dimensioned life;   

stay away from screens.   

Stay away from anything   

that obscures the place it is in.   

There are no unsacred places;   

there are only sacred places   

and desecrated places.   

iii   

Accept what comes from silence.   

Make the best you can of it.   

Of the little words that come   

out of the silence, like prayers   

prayed back to the one who prays,   

make a poem that does not disturb   

the silence from which it came.

Enough. These few words are enough.

If not these words, this breath.

If not this breath, this sitting here.

This opening to life

we have refused

again and again

until now.

Until now.