the poetry zendo: your final sight before closing your eyes

Our life is beautiful, o humans.

We are flesh and blood and life.

We are stone worn smooth by the flow of a river

That never knows rest.

We are the night clouds hammered like folded steel

Into swords that carve the stars from the sky,

Swords that cleave the light of the waxing moon.

And our life is beautiful, o humans.

Watch as our life grows through time

And kindness and sorrow.

Each teardrop strengthens a muscle in our heart,

Each kiss creates power.

Our children love us and need us,

And we need them even more.

Midnight again, moonlight and wind. I cannot put down the poems of Miyazawa Kenji and Ilya Kaminsky. I keep reading on into the night. Then my own scribbles in a notebook. A gust of wind rattles the old loose window and that which I call my soul shoots straight up into outer space. Spacemen gather to me, and I read them a poem.

It doesn't have to be a pistol, or a noose,

or poison, or drugs.

You don't have to crash the car into a freeway overpass

at one hundred miles per hour,

or stand in front of a fast train.

Of, course, all of those things work,

They will definitely get the job done.

But they're all so harsh, lacking

in any kind of beauty.
The end should have some beauty. You could be the guy who takes one last swim,

way out pass the breakers,

swimming until exhaustion takes you,

nothing but endless ocean around you at the end.

The strength of the sea. The power.

It isn't so much a suicide as it is an invitation

for death to come visit, or like making a request

to death, "If you're going my way, I could use a ride."

You could be that guy who makes one last hike

into the Sierra Nevada in full-on winter,

where the trail is covered in snow,

walking until the wee hours and then, exhausted,

you spread your parka on the ground

and lay down to sleep, lovely sleep,

your final sight before closing your eyes

are the lovely snowflakes coming down

soft and thick to land on your face,

perfect snowflakes, so beautiful,

no two of them are alike.

james lee jobe

Treat every moment as your last. It is not preparation for something else.

Shunryu Suzuki

There is no fire like greed, no sickness like hunger of heart, and no joy like the joy of freedom.

Buddhist Proverb

May every meal bring you nourishment of body and spirit. May every pause to eat remind you of your connection to others. May gratitude be the only response for the gift of food and all the love and work behind it.

Rev. Tania Yadira Márquez