ZEN SUTRA

The road to truth runs straight,
the twists and turns,
only prolong the quest.

Every fish breathes the needed air,
in low or high tide,
oblivious of ocean wide.

The wheeling universes
always on the run,
longing for soulful union.

Tired with turning beads
the realized know only one word,
love.

Love’s flame
shall open the secret door,
one step more shall make you free.

Fling these piles of books
in passions’ raging fire
to be the Zen.

Continence
the root restraint
on the path of ascent.

Calm of mind,
a heart that craves not,
makes you free, the living Zen.

Where you get to know who you are,
all your questionings cease,
fixed are you in your Buddha nature.

Futile this search
if it fails to give you equipoise,
the peace of Nirvana.

To obey the inner call,
to pass into life immortal,
death-in-Zen, the way.

No danger to go astray
on the path of Zen,
only caution, no vacillation.

Only intense love makes you see
Life’s hidden mystery,
lets you enter the deathless realm.

Zen will bestow the sight,
the ear to hear the unheard melody,
the joy of living creatively.

Not by ritual purification
but searching within,
the gates of illumination open.

Darkness lets us see
our true essence,
our Buddha nature.

A ceaseless yearning
to be out of the tunnel,
to see the Light.

Prayer is bathing
in pure waters of Zen
to wash the soul clean.

What you lose by excess,
recoup it by restraint,
zest once gone cannot return.

A prayer awakens in you
the hidden melody of existence,
flowers a whole spring within.

What holds the worlds together,
keeps the cosmic balance,
none but love.

Between man and man
the earth and heaven,
only love is.

Love the guide,
love the voyager,
love the destination.

Birth, death, love, time,
points in a unitive scale
to orchestrate life’s harmony.

Each speck in the macrocosm
has an appointed role,
no luminous sun without a black hole.

Life’s lustre lies
in living courageously
from moment to moment.

To the one in love
the whole world wears
the look of a royal feast.

Each one has to step
on one’s dead self,
to rise on to higher planes.

Dig up this fort of lower self
from the very roots,
to dig in the foundation of the higher self.

Smite with Zazen
all chords of your self
to let them emit sweet melodies.

The cross is not
what once shone in Bethelham,
but what shines in every soul.

Where no sense of separateness
there truth shines resplendent,
that's the moment for enlightment.

Light the pyre
to recover the immortal self,
to be filled and fulfilled.

Now and now alone,
descent ends, ascent begins,
the realisation dawns.

Who yearns for the whole
being flooded,
becomes the whole.

Heaven and hell within,
in-between an infinitesmal hair,
now the one, now the other.

Once on the vulture peak
you know the bliss of ordinariness,
your new found majesty.

No quivering restlessness,
no greed,
when dispassion sets in.

The sage enlightner
sets ablaze the fire divine,
burns away the karmic chains.

Close to the creator
in one plunge
touch the roof in one kick.

Renunciation,
of all acquisitiveness,
the way to Zen.

The way to deliverance
within every being,
only if he dives deep.

Your whole being a temple
effulging with loving devotion
the ladder to the ultimate.

The realm,
where forever flows the song,
where the eternal lights a million lamps.

Who tastes truth but once
he savours
its flavoured essence in every sip.

Every order, human or divine,
revolves round love’s nave,
it’s the very logos of life.

Love’s alchemy turns
every base metal into gold,
makes a new man.

The soul’s paradise
only for those who tread
on the razor-edge of life.

Past the flowing stream,
feel the light of bliss,
in all-enveloping darkness.

A million-eyed lotus
in every soul blooms
a thousand miracles in every wink.

Life acquires meaning
passing through love’s crucible
even death becomes divine.

Every moment a star of surprize
the questing soul’s choicest prize
a glow on the face .

The easiest way, the golden mean,
the avoidance of all extremes,
the key to all realisation.