To Celebrate National Poetry Month. . .
Here are some poems by the Zen master Ryokan, one of my favorites:
How can we ever lose interest in life?/
Spring has come again/ And cherry trees bloom in the mountains.
****
I came to this village to see the peach blossoms/
but spent the day instead/
Looking at the flowers along the river bank.
*****
O that my priest's robe were wide enough/
to gather up all the suffering people/ in this floating world.
****
Finshing a day of begging/
I return home through the green mountains./
The setting sun is hidden behind the western cliffs/
And the moon shines weakly on the streams below./
I stop by a rock and wash my feet./
Lighting some incense, I sit peacefully in zazen,/
Again, a one-man brotherhood of monks. . . .
When I read his poems, I want to go live in a hermitage.
Please share some of your favorite poems with me.
About Chitra
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni is an award-winning author and poet. Her work is widely known, as she has been published in over 50 magazines, including the Atlantic Monthly and The New Yorker, and her writing has been included in over 50 anthologies. Her works...
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