     Whether reading or writing them, haiku poems are pointers for paying attention to what is happening NOW, and can be a real aid to meditation. The three-line poems for which Zen is famous, came from the Zen Masters, and are a direct expression of Reality from the present moment. When there is no chatter from the “I thought,” then haiku can be fully appreciated, for if one is awake to the eternal now-moment, the little poems in all their simplicity acquire a universal significance. If Zen is truly the wordless teaching, this briefest kind of poetry may be the closest one can get to communicating what cannot be put into words.

     Traditional haiku was written in the Japanese language following a seventeen-syllable formula. The following poems do not adhere to that strict format because of the additional words required to say the same thing in English. It has been discovered, in studying haiku translations from the Japanese, that they do not use (or have access to) the same subject-verb sentence structure that we do. It appears as though the language itself is more in tune with the way things are actually happening, than English. Rather than having a separate subject who acts on the environment as something apart, events are communicated more as a spontaneous “happening.”

     For example, Basho’s classic and probably best-known haiku poem is literally translated as follows:

Old Pond:

frog jump-in

Plop!

Perhaps this is why the Japanese people have found it easy to adapt to the egoless, unitary message of Zen, where all is seen to be arising at once ji-ji-muge, everything at one time: i.e. the sun’s arising, the flower’s opening and my awakening occur simultaneously, without a doer which is separate from the Whole. The Whole is who I am, not the part. The subject-object, subject-verb way of talking and thinking conditions us falsely to believe that the way we are saying it is how it is. If we will but LOOK without talking or thinking, we will see directly how things are really happening!

S U M M E R

Scattered among the three-line haiku poems below, one will discover several other verses of varying lengths. All of them, however, are pointers to THIS moment and reminders to pay Attention to what is right in front of our nose!

Sound of bare feet

running past my window . . .

Summer vacation.

I’m swinging

on a “gateless gate.”

Will you swing, too?

Breathing the sea air,

chubby little girl running

up to me!

A chirping cricket

on a Summer night --

that is all there is.

                      The ripples of the lake appear
                             through the branches of the pine tree.
                      You may see it from many views
                             but the Seer remains the same.

                      If you wish to understand Reality
                             seek to know the Seer
                      In knowing the Seer
                             the many views will be understood.

Why do people
        go away on vacation?
There are no sunsets as beautiful
        as this One.

       Happiness is --
desiring things the way they are;
       including our inability
               to do so.

Summer morning,

awakened by a sound at the door.

A little black dog.

In the evening

old man working at the post office

looking for pennies.

Quiet Summer night;

sirens scream,

and then dogs.

The wind chimes

hanging from my shower rod

tinkling in the breeze.

On a Summer night

smoke rising from a distant hill.

Indians?

Hot night and from somewhere

a baby’s crying . . .

Oh, it’s a cat fight!

Waterfalls, ocean

and tears down the cheeks . . .

breathtaking shores of Hilo.

Morning solitude . . .

bird chirps and an occasional plop

from the pond below.

Pink and white baby

in the bright Summer sun

swinging.

A pair of sandals

just as they were taken off

lying on the floor.

The pine tree

has company this morning.

Fifteen noisy crows.

I caught the baby fly

and let him outside.

He was lost.

Little girl running

kitten hiding . . . again & again

Summer dance.

Afternoon tea time.

A grey pigeon daintily sips hers

from the gutter.

A car turned over

& people stand watching in silence...

the Summer moon.

Taking a walk --

the moon isn’t invited inside

after dark.

Walking at night.

Leaning on an old building

a red-haired woman.

At ten to six

the fountain begins to bubble

outside my door.

Bird flying
   happens all at once
      as people move together
         with the fly across the window.

Opening the door

a cool breeze is blowing in

and a moth!

Dishes do not need a doer

to get washed and shined

and put on the shelf.

Stillness . . .
     the world comes to life
             and movement goes on again
             through the trees.

Time to be Timeless . . .
this is our Destiny.

Yesterday I made the bed,
today, I swept the floor.

The blue of the sky
is reflected in my teapot.

                   Pink, lavender,
                          orange and grey
                                     the clouds are always
                                      going away...

Waking at night I discover
the problem of life to be
an illusion . . .
Just moon shadows on
the ceiling,
one fish flopping in the pond.

From “One Note of Zen”
Poems by Audrey