ten fussy days running this temple all red tape
look me up if you want to in the bar whorehouse fish market

nature's a killer I won't sing to it
I hold my breath and listen to the dead singing under the grass

suddenly nothing but grief
so I put on my father's old ripped raincoat

when I was forty-seven everybody came to see me
so I walked out forever

my monk friend has a weird endearing habit
he weaves sandals and leaves them secretly by the roadside

a crazy lecher shuttling back and forth between whorehouse and bar
this past master paints south north east west with his cock

no nothing only those wintry crows
bright black in the sun

peace isn't luck for six years stand facing a silent wall
until the you of your face melts like a candle

don't hesitate get laid that's wisdom
sitting around chanting what crap

life's like climbing knife-tree hills with swords sticking up
day and night something stabs you

we live in a cage of light an incredible cage
animals animals without end

sick of it whatever it's called sick of the names
I dedicate every pore to what's here

inside the koan clear mind
gashes the great darkness

ten years of whorehouse joy I'm alone now in the mountains
the pines are like a jail the wind scratches my skin

the wise know nothing at all
well maybe one song

men are like cows horses fuck poetry
look at your hand read it

I woke from a dream of death to day's amazing
death grass death rice death chairs death death asleep or
awake

no words sitting alone night in my hut eyes closed hands open
wisps of an unknown face

my death? who was it anyway always where he was never
no not once ever seeing himself an eyeball speaks

oh green green willow wonderfully red flower
but I know the colors are not there

my gray cat jumped up just as I lifted this spoon
we're born we die

if there's nowhere to rest at the end
how can I get lost along the way?

that stone Buddha deserves all the birdshit it gets
I wave my skinny arms like a tall flower in the wind

I won't die I won't go away I'll always be here
no good asking me I won't speak

only a kind deadly sincere man
can show you the way here in the other world

melons eggplants rice rivers the sky
I offer them to you on this holiday

oh yes things exist like the echo when you yell at the foot of a
huge mountain

hear the cruel no-answer until blood drips down
beat your head against the wall of it

the mind is exactly this tree that grass
without thought or feeling both disappear

not two not one either
and the unpainted breeze in the ink painting feels cool

go down on your silly knees pray
for what?  tomorrow is yesterday

I found my sparrow Sonrin dead one morning
and buried him just as gently as I would my own daughter

I hate it I know it's nothing but I
suck out the world's sweet juicy plum

why is it all so beautiful this fake dream
this craziness why?

it's logical:  if you are not going anywhere
any road is the right one

know nothing I know nothing nobody does can you face me
and know nothing know

stare at it until your eyes drop out
this desk this wall this unreal page

only one koan matters
you

you stand inside me naked infinite love
the dawn bell rips my dreaming heart

we're lost where the mind can't find us
utterly lost