Breadcrumbs

GERARD SARNAT

1. Mid-Septuagenian Blues

Was sort of a bull
back in salad days
when tongue still pink

but now I am more idle cow
what with dangling taste buds
extended to chew like Ger’s cud.

2. Inner Climate Change haiku

Is love the world’s glue?
You blame yourself and others.
Ban hate’s distractions.

Bless your past wisely.
Try not to acclimatize
to autobiographies.

Being human is
a bit more intense than most
of us can handle.

3. Anattā* haiku

Self is the center
of narrative gravity’s
rising and falling.

* non-self in Pali

4. Awaking From Delusion haiku

Heart-mind ambushes
morph into nonviolence
toward self and others.

Dharmic eyes create
room: streams then merge together
this present moment.

5. The only thing to it is to do it.

Snug as two bugs in a rug
after 50 years together,
a bit smug that these salad
days might last forever,
I realize one of us will be
ferryperson for the other.

Can our comparing minds
find ways to freedom
through peaks and valleys
of dharma practice’s
attempt to decrease both
clinging & suffering.

Wow, you did a swell job
when falling down!
Do we ever give ourselves
credit for disasters--
failed meditation or taking
care of grandkids?

You can’t despise yourself
into becoming a better
person but it’s quite possible
to love selves to death:
every karmic rollercoaster
ride wakens some heart.

More than those theoretical
strategies, actual
resonances wash through as
loving then spirals
toward ultimate acceptance
and even surrender.

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