Up a Shaking, Quivering Tree on a 1,000 Foot Cliff

Yesterday we completed a sweet weekend sesshin. Our theme during this period is the up-a-tree koan (see previous post) and we’re using Dogen’s “The Meaning of Bodhidharma Coming from the West” as our play ground.

Our entry point is to taste the branch in our mouth – how each of us is up-a-tree in this life, vulnerable and alone. Hung out to dry.

This koan is like a dream – like the one where you show up at work for an important presentation and discover that you’re naked.  

Fortunately, in the koan there is also someone who comes along and calls up to you, again and again. 

So maybe we’re not so alone. Our teeth are connected to the branch. The branch is connected to the tree. The tree is connected to the 1,000 foot cliff. The person below is calling.

And then it stops. 

We’ve had several deaths in the greater Zen community as the baby-boomer zeneration begins to exit stage left with three long-time priests affiliated with San Francisco Zen Center passing – Jerome Peterson, Darlene Cohen, and Lou Hartman (click the name for more – all three link you to exceptionally tender-hearted expression).

We also have some new online life from Zen teachers. Alan Senauke, successor of Mel Weitsman and long-time exemplar of engaged Buddhism, and Genmyo Smith, co-founder of the Ordinary Mind School with Joko Beck, have each started new blogs. I look forward to watching them bloom.

Meanwhile, there is the person calling, “What is the meaning of this one great life?”