Category: Images

NEWSFLASH!

Post author By Zen Open Circle
Post date April 23, 2021

In the early hours of Wednesday morning a strange assembly of beings was sighted in a moonlit clearing online. The exact nature of this meeting remains unclear.

According to eyewitnesses it appeared to be a Council of some kind, where each being present stepped forward one after the other to say something. Conspicuously, no humans were present. Concern is mounting that the many beings may have something to say to us. The list of beings at the Council apparently included a were-tiger, mosquito, forest raven, fox, kookaburra, corella, black cockatoo, migrating bird, snake, ibis, ibex, kangaroo, spider, seeds, rainforest, elephant, mountain, sky and nasturtium.

Once the assembly had dispersed no evidence of their activity remained, save the lingering sound of a song or lament, wafting through the clearing like notes from a harp.

If you have any more information about this Council, or would like to reflect on its possible significance, please contact gassho@zenopencircle.org.au

()K

Click here listen to all the recordings from our Autumn Sesshin 2021…

Images Poetry

Porous

By ~ Warren Summers

Bodies are porous:
Things go in,
Things go out,
Things go through.
Constantly.
Despite our efforts
To block, to pause, to bind, to insulate, to mask, to purify:
Bodies remain porous.

Hearts are porous:
Things go in,
Things go out,
Things go through,
Constantly.
Despite our efforts
To be reasonable, to be rational, to be logical:
Hearts remain porous.

Nations are porous:
Things go in,
Things go out,
Things go through.
Constantly.
Despite our efforts
To draw lines on maps, to police, to punish
To build, to reinforce, to mythologise, to manage, to expand:
Nations remain porous.

Planets are porous:
We go through them,
They go through us.
We go through us,
They go through them.
This going through
neither begins nor ends,
neither starts nor stops,
leaves no trace,
and yet makes all things possible.

The Self is a porous planet:
Heart beating in a failed State
A flimsy body infected with story
A song bordered with a desperate hope.
An unthing undone in the morning,
A mirage of a mystery at midday,
A phantom of darkness at sunset,
And flicker of fury in the evening.
We go in,
We go out,
We go through.
Constantly.
Despite our efforts
To sate, to soothe, to explain, to express,
To imagine, to know, to realise:
The self is a porous planet
Filled with stars.
And the stars are a porous promise:
Of brightness poured forth across a billion billions;
The moon lit with yesterday’s news,
Grown gardens arise from the ashes.
Such is the peculiar invention
The shadows remorseless revision
The fright, the diagnosis, the laughter,
The witness, the dancer,
The end.

Tags Warren Summers

2020 Term 2 Images Miscellaneous Online Zen Group Sand Talk Study Group

Virtual sand talking

It seemed at the latest study group,
that the virtual ZOOM whiteboard was our shared
material cultural activity today;
our campfire.

“The primary mode of communication in yarns is narrative – the sharing of anecdotes, stories and experiences from the lived reality of participants. Might include sand talk. Physical demonstrations are included. Sharing drink or food is often part of the ritual (most commonly cups of tea today). Often yarning will occur around a shared material cultural activity like weaving, painting, string making, Ceremony preparation, crossword puzzles and setting up birthday party decorations.”
Sand Talk pg 132

2020 Term 2 Black Lives Matter Images Online Zen Group Sand Talk

Generations

2020 Term 2 Images Sand Talk

Old friends… sunning themselves.

Post author By Zen Open Circle
Post date July 3, 2020
5 Comments on Old friends… sunning themselves.

2020 Term 1 Covid-19 Eco-Dharma Images Online Zen Group

Sheltering in Place with Eptasia

Post author By Zen Open Circle
Post date April 26, 2020
3 Comments on Sheltering in Place with Eptasia

by ~ Karen Fermin

Viewing notes: Please watch this with sound on.

We live with a stunning specimen from the plant world who I’ve named Eptasia. Or Epa for short.

Epa is a cactus which belongs to the night-blooming Cereus family.
I’m not sure what their botanical name is… perhaps someone knows and can let me know.

Epa was a gift from the former tenants of our home.
They gifted it to us as they were moving overseas (5 years ago) and couldn’t take it with them. They took a cutting and planned to grow another one in their new home. They had received it as a wedding present a few years earlier. We’re still in touch and I still send photos of Epa to them and we both continue to be nourished by our sweet connection.

Eptasia is a derivative of the greek word for 7 (epta). A cross section of one of Epa’s limbs would reveal a 7 pointed flower-like shape.

Epa is a steadfast companion for me. Along with the sun, the moon, the stars and the breeze.

One morning I wrote this after coming out to witness one of the flowers at dawn.

Night melts into day
Darkness into light
Many buds
Blossoming
From tough skin and prickles

I feel like this. Blossoming, from tough skin and prickles.

I hope you enjoy these recordings.

With love

Karen

Tags Karen Fermin, Shelter in place

Images Music Poetry

Folds in the sky

Post author By Zen Open Circle
Post date April 12, 2020

Dear Sangha,

This is a slideshow of images and haiku I recently made into a little film.

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May your lives go well,

Ron

Tags Haiku, Ikebana, Mountains & Rivers Zen Group, Ron C. Moss

2020 Term 1 Images Online Zen Group Poetry

Skin

by ~ Tessa Priest

Paintings which came from koan practice… snake appeared in my dream and then coiled onto wooden boards

I finished the paintings in the middle of the dark night and the next morning opened an old edition of Resurgence and found this poem.

Spring is coming in many places in the world as we are asked to quieten and be more still.

Our snakes may be readying to sleep in the cold, and yet snake appears – perhaps in our Spring we too may emerge with a lithe newness and a transformed earth body…

Skin

Everything has a voice, even the skin
the black snake left beside the house
the day the golden tulips bloomed
and overpowered the sun. Never seen,
that snake leaves its skin behind
each spring lie a secret gift
no longer dark or urgent without
its body. Oh
look at me, I’ve grown
and grown more beautiful, its voice
thralls from the grass, all
its language new and moving
in the skin like thunder
gathering into a noon
yet to form:
Have you heard me
down in the ductwork
of your house
living on mice?
Have you lived yet
a day without fear?
If not skin, what
will you come to shed?
Laurie Kutchins –
chosen for Resurgence magazine March/April 2009

“powerful poetry sings of the hidden complexity of things”.

If lives are fraught and contradictory, fraught with unexpected turns that result in unruliness…The god Lir (Ireland) created the world by speaking the names of everything in it. Because he had only half a tongue, his words were only half understood. Half of creation, therefore, remained unspoken.

That’s why we need poets: to “sing the hidden side of things” (Andrea Hollander Budy)

Blessings to you in this time of transformation with its quietude. May you wriggle anew as the spring unfurls – here it is autumn

Warmth

Tessa Priest