Shundo David Haye – Zen Priest

‘I sat by my fire all night and smoked my pipe and cast my tobacco dust on the fire and felt the soft breath of the sky over my body. In the morning I went up to a ridgetop and greeted the rising sun, then gathered wood for a sweating-fire and herbs from the mountaintop to incense my fire. And I returned to my camp and made my medicine and became peaceful again.

All day I lay in the meadow and thought of the beauty a d purity of creation. That night I kept my fire and smoked my pipe, cast tobacco dust on the fire and listened to hear the spirit of creation within me. As the deep of the night came upon me I began my chant, and I sang until all of the darkness of the world came about me and enfolded me and my body was lost, my spirit coming forth clean and free. Then I could sing the song of the dawn of creation, and I could know again the lost language of the wo-gey and sing their songs in the presence of creation. My spirit walked forth into the spirit land and became pure. ln the morning my spirit returned to my body and I woke up.

The morning was bright and clear and I was hungry, for I hadn’t eaten in three days. I knelt beside the stream and put my hand down under the edge of the bank and hummed the song of the fish-talk. Trout swam into my hand, and in this way l caught enough fish for my eating.

Then it was that I could go back to the places where there were people, for I had come back into creation and was renewed. I was no longer bothering about the small, selfish things that the world of people values and strives and fights for, so it did not matter what it was that had disturbed me and made me go to make my prayer. For how can one put importance on childish desires when one has walked in beauty in the face of creation?’ (from Wind Bell)