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Pink Hollyhock
just being alive—
I
and the poppy
*David G. Lanoue. Pure Land Haiku: The Art of Priest Issa.
*Issa, 1763-1828, Japan, Lay Buddhist Priest, Jodo Shinshu; poet, mendicant. Issa is one of the three foremost haiku poets in Japanese history.
* * *
In the Silence, I find myself looking for Nothing;
then even that look ceases to look.
Then where are You?
You Whom I sought disappeared.
Since You are Nowhere,
I cannot find You anywhere.
Since this last look dissolved in You,
I see the seeing is You -
Where do I end? You begin?
Neither in nor out - speechless! ... ecstasy -
mind quiet, silence seen no more.
And motions inarticulate moves
over and through me as You - as me.
No separation, You and I, and Here, Grace, delectable Grace...
sinks into the Nothingness of Bliss beyond taste.
So, from where do these words arise? Why? Who to whom?
And somehow - I know not how - I find
I am still here.
* * *
Issa reminds us, we do not have to do anything persons might call special, holy, enlightened, religious, or spiritual to engage reality, so love reality. We may engage in religious rituals with others, group meditation or alone, pray and read scriptures daily, participate in a yoga group, go on a pilgrimage to an acclaimed holy site, ...
Yet, Issa says, we may recognize we are alive with the poppy. In that intimacy, we are love, and the poppy is love. We engage the poppy, and the poppy engages us. We fall in love together at that moment of shared recognition.
Yet, the poppy remains and I remain. The holy communion cannot be without the poppy being the poppy and Issa being Issa.
So, the poem affirms, reminding us that in the ecstasy of holy union, "I" remain; "I am still here." Who is this? What is it? I do not know, yet it appears.
* * *
As the Psalmist sings in Psalms 42.7 of the Jewish Scriptures, "Deep calls to deep" or "Deep invites deep." The depth of the most ordinary things, like a poppy, and our depth, like an Issa, a you, a me, share a single depth, a depth calling to be recognized, loved, cared for, and enjoyed with praise. In this reciprocal, resounding act of intimacy, the bliss of love manifests itself, which is the depth itself: you yourself. "I" finds itself, for it goes into the intimacy to discover, as the Buddhists say, its - so our - True Face, or as Christian contemplatives say, the True Self. This Self, we discover, is one self, yet many selves, as all rays of the Sun is the Sun.
Issa is not the appearance with a name, yet Issa is not other than the appearance with a name. Issa being intimate with Issa, Issa is intimate with the poppy. So, intimacy calls out to intimacy. In welcoming the other, we welcome ourselves. In loving the other, we love God, and the loving is God. Wonderful!
* * *
(C) Brian K. Wilcox, 2025
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