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Thread: A Few (too many) words about Ryokan's Poetry

  1. #1

    A Few (too many) words about Ryokan's Poetry

    In a recent teaching from Taigu (a particularly beautiful one called "Original Face, Dogen's Words), he says that poetry doesn’t need to be unraveled, a sentiment I completely agree with. As a (sometimes) teacher of literature, I’m constantly trying to tell students that they should not try to figure out what a poem means. To stop figuring out poems. To not even think there’s something to figure out. Most of us all know this, but typically people new to poems/literature in general always think of a poem as puzzle (especially in the west) – how do all these parts fit together and what does it all mean?

    It’s pretty much the same mistake we make with life.

    That being said, I love playing with a poem’s meaning and making meaning out of myself from the poem, or at other times just being with a poem, while at still other times going deeply into and disappearing with a poem – it all depends on the poem.

    But this is just a little introduction to what I’d really like to talk about for a few minutes: Ryokan and what a Ryokan poem does. In other words, what Ryokan’s poems do to me. See, I think it’s a lot more helpful to talk about poetry, and art in general, as a thing which does something to (or maybe better put, with) the audience/reader, or as a thing which is done between audience and artist and art-object, all together at once, doing together, being done. So, the easiest way to talk about this is to talk about what Ryokan’s poems do to me, this little limited self with his little limited views. So let’s begin with a line or two from Ryokan, from some of his “Chinese” poems, the first stanza from One Robe, One Bowl:

    One narrow path surrounded by a dense forest;
    On all sides, mountains lie in darkness.
    The autumn leaves have already fallen.
    No rain, but still the rocks are dark with moss.
    Returning to my hermitage along a way known to few,
    Carrying a basket of fresh mushrooms
    And a jar of pure water from the temple well.

    Before I say too much, I want to indicate that I understand that just the idea of talking of poetry like this, which is profound and simple, as clear and pure as the pure water in Ryokan’s jug, is fraught with complexities. How does one talk about pure water, blue sky? But I’m a writer and part of my job (and I see it as much more than a job, more than just a hobby, and also, at the same time, of no importance at all) is this: to say that what this poem does to me is make me live some other life, allow a glimpse of some simple and profound and also lonely “way” that is “known to few”; what this poem, over two hundred years old, does is bring me to that “narrow path” on the way to Ryokan’s “hermitage” – it pulls me into this near-winter forest, returning to my (now reading myself as Ryokan; Ryokan and I one) lonely place; what’s paradoxical here is that while the poem transports me to Japan, probably sometime in the late 1700’s, it also makes me fully present now, here, wherever I might be, present with what is, which is just another way of saying the poem gets me gone a little. Please know, also, that all of this is instantaneous when reading. It just happens, and it’s only upon reflection that I realize (or think I realize) what has happened. And furthermore, it’s only through language that whatever this poem does instantly in the moment gets turned into a kind of chronological thing (which seems to be three things, all at once, all perfectly simple, but which in language I can only express chronologically and linearly and complexly: 1) it transports me to the past, 2) turns me into a simple hermit, and 3) opens me up to what is, no more me, everything just as it is). So, this very simple experience with Ryokan’s poem, upon reflection, gets turned into something that seems fairly complex, and that is sometimes seen as a negative thing: too complex, you know? But all this complexity really is is my playing with a poem – and this is the thing that I try to convey to my literature students (please don’t think I’m trying to teach anything now, I’m just sharing): that the best way to engage with a poem is to be with it and let it be you and then to play. Maybe you’ll make some meaning and maybe you won’t, but what will certainly happen is you and the poem.

    As a kind of addition to the above thoughts, and a more pointedly Zennie aspect of these thoughts on Ryokan, I’d like to add that I often read something before sitting Zazen. I especially like to read a poem of Ryokan’s and as Jundo often says, Sit with that. Zazen, Shikantaza, is not an attitude. But I think it’s very beautiful (and possibly helpful) to approach sitting with a certain attitude. Maybe this is what Dogen calls Way-seeking Mind, though that, I think, is probably something much bigger than attitude (please excuse me: now that we’re into Zen talk and not poetry, I know very very little). But for me, it’s all much simpler: if I sit with an attitude of awareness, let-go-Mind allows itself to be itself. So, I like reading a little before sitting because if I don’t, sometimes it’s easy for me to think: “Okay, I have to go sit now, crap, I have to make dinner and do laundry and get ready for work tomorrow and grade papers,” etc. And that seems to be the wrong mind to sit with. I don’t mean it’s bad; we all must sit this way sometimes. But if I’m always sitting this way, I’m more of a bump on the log, not present or aware at all, not sharp, and I’m really missing something and I’m probably not really sitting Zazen (though there’s no wrong Zazen). So for this reason, I like to read something like this:

    The vicissitudes of this world are like the movements of the clouds.
    Fifty years of life are nothing but one long dream.
    Sparse rain: in my desolate hermitage at night,
    Quietly I clutch my robe and lean against the empty window.

    These lines do a number of things: they remind me of Jundo's teachings (the constant coming and going of clouds); they remind me of Taigu's teachings (he often discusses and reminds us of this “long dream”); and they remind me that Ryokan’s “desolate hermitage” is also mine, is all of ours, and Ryokan, who was often joyful and playful, also gave us poems of great loneliness, and that is felt here; finally, these lines remind me that we’re all, however lonely/alone, also clutching the Buddha’s robe and leaning against the “empty window,” everything empty. And so I think these lines, and others like them from Ryokan, allow us to consider: where is our desolate, lonely hermitage? Where is our robe? Where are the mountains in the rain in our life? Where the moon and where the dream?

    Anyway, thanks for reading and Gassho.
    Last edited by alan.r; 05-06-2013 at 09:37 PM.
    Shōmon

  2. #2
    This one shall investigate more, much obliged. _/\_

  3. #3
    Well said. Thanks.
    _/_
    Rich
    MUHYO
    無 (MU, Emptiness) and 氷 (HYO, Ice) ... Emptiness Ice ...

    https://instagram.com/notmovingmind

  4. #4
    Superbly expressed. As an ex scholar and literature lecturer in university ( you would not believe it when you see my appaling typo sometimes) I bumped into the very same issue: how to speak about poetry without stripping the whole thing? How to inspire people rather than kill them with rhetorics and technical blablabla?

    That's partly why I gave up the game and these days I write bad poetry and fiction rather than talk about it.

    Gassho

    Taigu

  5. #5
    Thanks Alan - Ryokan's poetry is a wonderful gateway to understanding.

    Gassho

    Willow

  6. #6
    Dear Alan,

    thank you for sharing your thoughts with us. Ryokan is my hero

    Gassho,

    Hans Chudo Mongen

  7. #7
    Thank you Alan. You appear to be that valuable and rare thing: a great reader. The myriad things come forth and verify the self.
    Gassho
    Myozan

  8. #8
    Thank you, Alan.

    Gassho,

    Kyonin
    Hondō Kyōnin
    奔道 協忍

  9. #9
    Thank you, Alan. You are right that Ryokan takes us both back to his time and to the present moment. I had never thought of it like that before but it is a perfect description.

    Gassho
    Andy

  10. #10
    Mp
    Guest
    Thank you Alan.

    Gassho
    Shingen

  11. #11
    Thanks everyone for reading.

    Hi Taigu. I love your bad poems so much - I still remember the first time I read them on your blog but was too shy to write a response in the comments. And I sometimes consider leaving the game, but...

    And Karasu, I think you just rewrote my entire thing with this: "Ryokan takes us both back to his time and to the present moment." Yes.

    gassho
    Shōmon

  12. #12
    Alan, thank you so much for sharing your thoughts. I enjoyed reading your post.

    I have to confess, I'm often one of those people that tries to figure out the meaning of every word and sentence rather than just enjoying the beauty of poetry such as Ryokan.

    Gassho
    Matt

  13. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by MattW View Post
    Alan, thank you so much for sharing your thoughts. I enjoyed reading your post.

    I have to confess, I'm often one of those people that tries to figure out the meaning of every word and sentence rather than just enjoying the beauty of poetry such as Ryokan.

    Gassho
    Matt
    No confession needed. It's pretty much what we're trained to do. As Yoda says, "you have to unlearn what you have learned" and then both enjoy, make meaning, not worry about making meaning, not worry about enjoying, just play with a poem. It takes practice though, like riding bike or any skill, even to be able to play well.

    gassho
    Shōmon

  14. #14
    Thank you Alan. I am pretty dense when it comes to reading poetry. Your post will help.

    Gassho, John

  15. #15
    Thanks Alan. Those poems were beautiful, they really moved me. I appreciated your words about poetry as well. I love writing poems myself, though it's been awhile. You may have just inspired me to pick it up again. I'm also going to definitely check out more Ryokan.

    Gassho

  16. #16
    Interesting podcast on Ryōkan's life from Upaya Centre for those who are fans of the great fool!

    http://www.upaya.org/dharma/joan-hal...and-our-minds/


    Gassho
    Andy

  17. #17
    _/|\_

    David

  18. #18
    Quote Originally Posted by Karasu View Post
    Interesting podcast on Ryōkan's life from Upaya Centre for those who are fans of the great fool!

    http://www.upaya.org/dharma/joan-hal...and-our-minds/


    Gassho
    Andy
    Oh cool. I've been out of town for a couple days. Thanks for sharing this!

    gassho
    Shōmon

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