I stand on the doorstep.
What do you want to see? says the sky.
I don’t want to see anything.
I’m tired of seeing, moving, searching.
I want to sit somewhere, be still, listen.
Somewhere no-one will expect me to talk.
Somewhere I am no-one.
A ghost in the world.
Zhuangzi says chasing even that
is not the Way. You’re chasing an object:
something outside you that always recedes.
The quiet place is inside you
in all the sounds of space.
What do you want to hear? says the sky.
No more questions, I say.
I want to hear the lap-slap of wavelets at the edge of a lake
I want to hear a dove coo / and another answer
I want to hear a car pass without being afraid it will kill us all with its carbon
I want to hear a man whistling / as he walks to his place / of work
I want to hear the ten pm train / without wondering / in what year it will cease to run
I want to sleep / without dreaming / that all the butterflies die at once and are not reborn
Without dreaming / of a strange sour land / too hot to inhabit
I want to wake up without that / in the back of my head
People carry on
as if death will never come
Making five year plans, ten year plans, investing
People carry on as if death will arrive tomorrow
Eating, drinking …
In spacetime, says the sky,
or in Hawking & Hartle’s imaginary time,
every moment, then now when,
always
is
You can carry yourself
as if death has / already come
A sadhu, a monk, a ghost in the world …
Or just a practitioner
of wu wei:
not here,
not anyone,
exerting no
force