At the time, I had been reading a lot of Dogen and sitting a lot of zazen. (is there such a thing as too much?)

Then, one day, riding my bicycle on Snow Road, south of Old Mesilla, NM, looking directly into the horizon at the Organ Mountains I had a realization moment and it was so overwhelming that I stopped and got off my bike, staring at the mountains and it occurred to me; “those mountains! they’re sleeping Buddhas! Lying down Buddhas!” My thoughts stopped and for a moment and my perception was clear. What I experienced was mountains-as-mountains. Ever since then when I see mountains-as-mountains I feel a deep serenity and solidity. It’s real to me.

Long before I ever heard of Dogen, in the mid- 70’s, I was introduced to the writing of the zen-beat poet Gary Snyder, which for me was an early introduction to Zen. He was, along with Richard Braughtigan, one of my favorites. I had read Rip-rap and Cold Mountain Poems. Since I have read Dogen, I now see that he was a seminal source of inspiration for Snyder. Gary Snyder was a Dogen re-incarnate for the times in which he lived, a voice of Zen and the American wild-ness experience. He went on to pen a really long poem called Mountains and Rivers Without End, it is an epic of geology, prehistory, mythology real and imagined based in Asian art, Native American storytelling, Americana and Zen. It’s his early opus, I consider it his Shobogenzo. When I eventually encountered Dogen’s Shobogenzo, Snyder was waiting right there for me!

The Mountains and Rivers Sutra offers us mountains and rivers as the expression self-so or tsu-jan. The usual ideas of dualistic thinking about animate and inanimate, self and other, sentient and non-sentient beings are transformed into the expression of enlightened view through his poetic imagery. Mountains and rivers are not inert landscapes but are active expressions of the Dharma, embodying Buddha-nature, the intrinsic reality that pervades all existence.

One of the wonderful expressions in the sutra is: “the blue mountains are constantly walking,” I love this! Does he mean this literally? The “walking” of mountains describes the dynamic nature of all phenomena; existence itself is in constant flux, and there really is no difference between the movement of a human and the movement of a mountain. This is interbeing, interconnectedness; all phenomena intimately share the same fundamental reality. So, yes, literally! I can hear Snyder’s Rip-rap…granite ingrained…

This view is suchness, awareness, rigpa, quiet-mind. Mind-at-rest-in-naturalness. These mountains and rivers are not symbols of something beyond themselves; they are expressions of themselves, expressions of truth, tathātā, in their own right, manifestations of Buddha-nature as it is, as it actually exists.

Through practice, we come to experience first-hand no separation, Hsin Hsin Ming’s no choosing.

“Attaining the Way is not difficult, Just avoid picking and choosing.
If you have neither aversion nor desire, You’ll thoroughly understand.
A hair’s breadth difference
Is the gap between heaven and earth.“

That which we once experienced as the distinctions between animate and inanimate become the whole, no gap. We perceive mountains and rivers as having and expressing intrinsic wisdom. Within the expression “all-beings” we can understand with our hearts that this truly includes the ten thousand things, the entire cosmos. We hear the rip-rap of the universe.

When we realize the truth inherent in our relationship with the natural world we recognize the inseparability of all existence. Do you include yourself?

_Riprap

_{BY GARY SNYDER}

Lay down these words

Before your mind like rocks.

             placed solid, by hands

In choice of place, set

Before the body of the mind

             in space and time:

Solidity of bark, leaf, or wall

             riprap of things:

Cobble of milky way,

             straying planets,

These poems, people,

             lost ponies with

Dragging saddles—

             and rocky sure-foot trails.

The worlds like an endless

             four-dimensional

Game of Go.

             ants and pebbles

In the thin loam, each rock a word

             a creek-washed stone

Granite: ingrained

             with torment of fire and weight

Crystal and sediment linked hot

             all change, in thoughts,

As well as things.

_{Deep Peace & Great Love,}

_Issan

Schedule 11/3-9

Monday, 6:30am, Zazen, Aishi hosting

Wednesday, 6:30am, Zazen, Dokusan and Service, Issan Sensei

Thursday, 6:30am, Zazen, Andy hosting

Friday, 6:30am, Zazen, Sokukai hosting