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Monday, 6 August 2012

LOTUS IN A SEA OF MUD

If You Sit
Near a Famous Person
The Urge to Speak
Becomes Uncontrollable

If You Sit
Near a Tree
The Urge to Be Silent
Becomes All Powerful

Down By The Lotus Pond
Frogs Busy Themselves with Chatter
Fathoms Deep, the Mud Settles Quietly
So Quietly, Only Leaves Can Hear It -

Above,
We Make Our Choices
To be Frogs
Or Lotuses.

No Matter What We Choose
The Mud Is Inescapable.

(c) Shaista Tayabali, 2012
Son Ha Temple, Plum Village
The idea of the lotus in a sea of mud applies to so many people who smile deeply and laugh beautifully with their eyes and mouths, but are really the final product of many years of suffering intensely. In Plum Village, you see many lotuses. 
Here in dear old Shelford, I am not much of a lotus - am mostly mud in a sea of infections. I developed a fever a few days after arriving in PV, not helped by the fierce French sun, and fabulously new foreign bacteria. Have just visited the doc and am set up with 'special' antibiotics. Which is all rather depressing, so to cheer you up, here is our updated telephone booth character :)
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5 comments:

  1. Mary Helen-Art Saves Lives7 August 2012 at 01:08

    I think this may be why I am drawn to being very close to living trees. My home is a cabin in the woods and the whispers are gentle poetry if I take the time to listen. Peace, Mary Helen Fernandez Stewart

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  2. SG7 August 2012 at 08:25

    I hope you feel better.
    Aren't we all lotuses and frogs to some extent?

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  3. Sherry Blue Sky7 August 2012 at 16:20

    Lovely poem, Shaista. I hope you feel better soon.....It is so lovely to think of you there, with Thay........and you? you are ALWAYS a lotus!!!!!!

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  4. Marcoantonio Arellano (Nene)8 August 2012 at 04:05

    Shaista, if lotus yield flowers, you are the flower. Hope you will soon feel better and to put a lighter note on a word, you are infectious to us.

    I send you only good thoughts

    ReplyDelete
  5. Jeanne-ming Brantingham10 August 2012 at 15:25

    Shaista you are the flower. The lotus int he mud. Despite the infection, despite the mud, I am glad you are are there.

    ReplyDelete