A single pear in its ripeness this morning swollen ripe,
its texture rough rouged,
more demanding upon the eye than the tree
branching about it.
More demanding than the ornate grouping limbs
of a hundred perfect trees.
Yet flawed, marked as with a fingernail,
a bird’s jabbing beak, the bruise of rot,
benign as a birth mark, a family blemish.
Still, its solitary stubborn weight, is a bugle,
a summoning of brass.
The pride of it subdues the orchard.
More astonishing than acres of trees, the army of ladders,
the worker’s stray shouts.
That first pear’s weight exceeds the season’s tonnage,
costly beyond estimation,
a prize, a riddle, a feast.
Joyce Carol Oates
Dirt on the cool melon
muddied
by the morning dew.
BASHO
Obey the nature of things [your own nature]
and you will walk freely and undisturbed.
When thought is in bondage, the truth is hidden,
for everything is murky and unclear,
and the burdensome practice of judging
brings annoyance and weariness.
What benefit can be derived
from distinctions and separations? . . .
. . . For the unified mind in accord with the Way
all self-centered striving ceases.
Doubts and irresolutions vanish
and life in true faith is possible.
With a single stroke we are free from bondage;
nothing clings to us and we hold to nothing.
All is empty, clear, self-illuminating,
with no exertion of the mind’s power.
Here thought, feeling, knowledge and imagination
are of no value.
In this world of Suchness,
there is neither self nor other-than-self.
Master Jianzhi Sengcan
(Todos los textos están tomados del libro The Zen of Creativity:Cultivating Your Artistic Life (English Edition), de John Daido Loori).