On and On into Infinite Mystery (Friday Poets' Poetry Exchange)

White clouds clinging to mountains tops
A thousand grasses bend with dew,
Fallen pines hum in the wind

What is the pattern which
connects all the living creatures?

The elegant dance of everything
Flowing with recognition and empathy

Let Heaven and Earth go about their changes
Moonlight on Old Mountain is white
Spring-water in the creak is clear
Water-falls mist the valley below

Silent knowledge- spirit is enlightened of itself
Contemplate the sky: this world exceeds stillness
Old Mountain has many hidden wonders

When the sun shines, water sparkles colors
When wind blows, trees swirl and dance
On silent lake, I purify my ears

Rambling among the clouds, far from society
Gone, and a million things leave no trace
Loosed, and it flows through the galaxies
A fountain of light, into the very mind

The anatomy of the living and non-living
is repetitive and rhythmical

It is, like music, repetitive with harmony
A flow of information is unitied
Not a thing, and yet it appears before me
Things are symbols of themselves

Now I know the pearl of the deep-nature
Know its use: a boundless perfect jeweled net
The pattern which connects the living with the non-living

Be responsive to the patterns which connect,
the butterfly to pollen and the grove to
the clouds and all four of them to me

And all the six of us to the amoeba
in one direction and back to the everywhen

Be responsive to the Infinite Mystery,
The pattern which connects to Eternity

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Photos taken by me at Devils Postpile National Park and Yosemite National Park, California, USA.

Also See:
Old Mountain Sutra
To Regain The First Temples