Finishing our month of quiet practices here, bundling up for the first deep freeze this week, committing to more time in the zendo, the truth of impermanence is close at hand these days. Today’s audio includes a reading of this post, a new poem, followed by a few minutes of silent meditation together. And if you’ve been reading along with me, you’ll notice the title of this column has changed from Softening Time to Holding Nothing. Why?
Receiving potent guidance from a trusted friend recently, I’m choosing to apply it to my life, work, even to my distance parenting. Echoing ancient, poetic Chan wisdom I’d heard from a dharma brother in Japan earlier this year, seems this shift began back then. Seems I’d written it down in my notes twice during a delicious meal; just found it again. Feels hauntingly familiar, worth respecting.
“Welcome nothing, refuse nothing, reflect everything, hold nothing.”
Carmen Herrera, Adios, 2010.
New patient arrived to the hospice this week, choosing medical assistance for her death this Sunday morning. We’ll call her Camille, late seventies, born in Provence, elegant beyond. So proud, caring, clear. One can learn so much about by helping a person unpack for their final settling in.
Finding drawers for her things, folding her clothing meticulously, taking my time, listening as she shared her ancestors with me, I got to know her swiftly. With lavender arrangements and pockets of beauty surrounding her in her room, she’s enjoying the fact that she can speak French with me and another volunteer.
Her body is failing fast, a series of conditions I won’t share here—suffice to say her discomfort is unspeakably painful, pervading her days entirely. Her pain is now somewhat managed, but even that management yields another series of complications with which she’s unwilling to live more than the next few days. So I’m feeling subsumed in the most meaningful way by the reality of everything passing.
A poem emerged one morning this week about the quotidian profundity of life here in my home with my partner, along with thankfulness, anguish, fear, then some traces of peace. It’s called “wondering.”
wondering
keeping death close
surrounded by all this
courage and language
i can feel the day we let go of this house, the boxes gone
child long driven off with his things to his own home
what of us remains then, i wonder:
all the encounters in the hallway
chats in the tub
walks on the path
boasts in your cactus garden
my green leaves growing too tall
bursting through the aging covers on the garden beds
have you really looked at this section, you ask
your face, so eager,
and this one?
and i wonder.
where did i pack your special cross,
and the precious stone, and that ring of your mom’s
what about the figurine of the
small deity riding the swan
the one i broke
and the framed calligraphies, do i want those
with me?
what’s left of us then,
when these cabinets are long empty
and
this poem has unspooled, exhausted itself
i wonder who will live here next once we’re gone
Inviting your thoughts.
Might you inquire within yourself what might be left when you’ve moved on?
Is there sadness, relief, nothing, something else?
Are you settling with, perhaps moving through, whatever’s present for you this week?
Might you be willing to share any of this with me?
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