On Crossing Without a Ferry (Han Shan)

Ignorance in a prior lifetime

Makes awakening less certain today

Whatever seems lacking in this life

Always stems from a prior life’s wrongs

And if you don’t strive to improve today

The next life will proceed as before

There’s no ferry boat waiting

On either shore of this vast expanse

Yet somehow we manage the hard crossing 

生前大愚痴

不为今日悟

今日如许贫

总是前生作

今生又不修

来生还如故

两岸各无船

渺渺难济渡

Q & A in the Middle of the Mountains (by Li Bai)

Ask why I stay

So many days

In these blue green mountains

A laugh is my only answer    

Leisure fills my heart

As a peach blossom

Falls into the river

To be carried far away

On the current

Apart from Heaven and Earth

From the human realm estranged

山中问答

李白

问余何意栖碧山

笑而不答心自闲

桃花流水窅然去

别有天地非人间

Everyday Levitation

Sublunar and lunar are

Much closer than you think

When it comes to buoyancy

Walking is everyday levitation 

And air is our best medium of exchange

From point A to point B

A Sunday stroll

Parkour

And soaring

Only being different

In the manner and degree

To which we are borne aloft

By the firing of our pistons

And the elasticity of

Our ankles and knees

A Drug of Last Resort

Sobriety is my drug
Of last resort to be
Administered only
With extreme caution
Via these tiny ampules
Packed with love and light
Even in the lowest possible dosage
As it's absorbed continuously
Through my skin and pores
Slowly I feel it course
Through my veins
Across body and brain
Minute by minute
I feel myself reacquiring
An immunity to daylight and
All that is simple and plain --
Both the beauty and ugliness
Of the unvarnished truth

Ode for the Meme World

The memes of me

That I fling at the world

Shared with the wind

And broadcast across 

Rooftops and gutters 

Yet I turn but a deaf ear to 

The wind's return utterance

While attending only to 

The plangent pings

Of the meme world's

Continuous fluttering

Far more fragile than dream world

It's a construct of eyelash 

And looking glass

Yet from this house of memes 

I fear there's no easy egress 

A Liminal Perch

Speak 

Though there's nothing to say

When the door has opened 

At the wind's prompting

And swings on its hinges

Without least concern

For whatever shall cross 

The threshold

There's always 

A twinge or two

As you begin to relax

In the precinct of knowledge

That resides within 

Your ligaments 

And bones

Tease forth the butterfly

That's perched on your lap

And let it settle gently on

The golden flower that

Blossoms unbidden

Now waking and sleeping

Both trend the same way