According to Buddha
The winter solstice is the time of ending and beginning, a powerful time…a time to contemplate your immortality. A time to forgive, to be forgiven, and to make a fresh start. A time to awaken.
***
a day or so ago ~ Wagner Natural Area rests on Treaty 6 lands ~ December 2021
According to Buddha
Beginning with the early dawn, I will radiate my cheer to everyone I meet today. I will be the mental sunshine for all who cross my path this day.
when we scream, our lips don’t make a sound
we march, with feet on solid ground
we walk, where no one wants to go, on this untraveled road
***
Saskatchewan Highway 16, spaces along the Alberta and Saskatchewan highway ~ 2016.
According to Buddha
When we learn to stop and be truly alive in the present moment, we are in touch with what’s going on within and around us. We aren’t carried away by the past, the future, our thinking, ideas, emotions, and projects. Often we think that our ideas about things are the reality of that thing. Our notion of the Buddha may just be an idea and may be far from reality. The Buddha outside ourselves was a human being who was born, lived, and died. For us to seek such a Buddha would be to seek a shadow, a ghost Buddha, and at some point our idea of Buddha would become an obstacle for us.
the sun goes down and five years gone
life goes on, yes, life goes on
i hope you caught up with your dreams
i hope you saved part of yourself for me
***
Edmonton, Alberta ~ in/outside downtown ~ November 2015.
According to Buddha
Breathing in, I am aware of my body. Breathing out, I am aware of my body.
ramblin’ rose, ramblin’ rose
why you ramble, no one knows
wild and wind-blown, that’s how you’ve grown
who can cling to a ramblin’ rose?
***
St. Albert, Alberta ~ Worldwide Photo Walk ~ random streets ~ October 2015.
According to Buddha
The places that we will experience in future rebirths will be the outcome of the karma that we share with the other beings living there. The actions of each of us, human or nonhuman, have contributed to the world in which we live. We all have a common responsibility for our world and are connected with everything in it.
she said slow down this train
slow down the iron that runs in my veins
***
Ukrainian Cultural Heritage Village, along Highway 16 ~ Alberta ~ August 2015.
According to Buddha
Just as fog is dispelled by the strength of the sun
and is dispelled no other way,
preconception is cleared by the strength of realization.
There’s no other way of clearing preconceptions.
Experience them as baseless dreams.
Experience them as ephemeral bubbles.
Experience them as insubstantial rainbows.
Experience them as indivisible space.
still your hands
and still your heart
for still your face comes shining through
and all the morning glows anew
still your mind
still your soul
***
North Saskatchewan River, Ogícize wakpá ~ Edmonton, Alberta, September 2015.
According to Buddha
I will teach you the Dhamma compared to a raft, for the purpose of crossing over, not for the purpose of holding onto. Listen and pay close attention. I will speak.
my game, please don’t leave me
come so far, don’t lose me
it matters where you are
***
Edmonton, Alberta ~ North Saskatchewan River ~ July 2015
According to Buddha
Through daily practice and attending fellowship, the lifestyle will take care of itself. When we engage in daily practice of the nembutsu as a ‘living’ practice, and not just an intellectual exercise, naturally, our lives will be transformed into the substance of shinjin, the experience of awakening.
every chance we got
we were down by the river all night long
when the sun came up i was sneakin’ her home
and draggin’ my butt to work
with the smell of her perfume on my shirt
i’d be on the tractor she’d be on my mind
with that sun beatin’ down on this back of mine
just when I thought it couldn’t get no hotter
i fell in love with the farmer’s daughter
we got married last spring
whoa and there ain’t no better life for me
***
The Stony Plain & Parkland Pioneer Museum, Stony Plain, Alberta ~ May 2015.
According to Buddha
When others put you down for who you are or what you’re doing, it just means that you’re going in the right direction.
one two three and four is five,
everybody here is a friend of mine.
whatever happened to the Duke of Earl?
pop goes the world.
***
Edmonton, Alberta ~ Hawrelak Park ~ May 06, 2015.
According to Buddha
On a trail atop White-Crane’s green cliffs,
My recluse friend’s home in solitude,
Step and courtyard empty; water and rock,
Forest and creek free of axe and fish trap.
Months and years perfect old pines here.
Wind and frost keep bitter bamboo sparse.
Gazing deep, ancestral ways my own again…
give it time and we wonder why do what we can laugh and we cry
and we sleep in your dust because we’ve seen this all before
culture fades with tears and grace leaving us stunned hollow with shame
we have seen this all seen this all before
many tribes of a modern kind doing brand new work same spirit by side
joining hearts and hands and ancestral twine ancestral twine
slowly it fades
slowly we fade
spirit bird she creaks and groans she knows she has, seen this all before she has, seen this all before…
***
Edmonton, Alberta ~ Terwillegar Park ~ April 2015.
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