Tag Archives: Ox-Herding

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connecting

by

catching the Ox

blossoms of desire
brew a strong tea
~ firing separation

to be intimate
~ we struggle

mirrored and reflecting

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The Ox and I dance.  He turns the horns of delusion towards me and the ferocity of wanting overwhelms me.  Infused with my desires, he reflects what I believe will make me whole; blinded by the need to fulfill my desires, true intimacy eludes me.  I cannot see with my whole body and mind.  This is the karma of desire: I see in the Other what I believe will make me whole.  This is the nature of spiritual infatuation which, as with lust, will fail me consistently and inevitably.  Driven only by the heat of longing, the faith beyond labels evaporates and my spiritual practice becomes calcified – rigid and girdled by form.  Already, I long for the early days of heady excitement, the mystery that fired the search.  I mistake this for intimacy and the longing makes our dance a ritual of possession.  Slowly, in the space between steps, I see how the illusion of ownership is protective – surely against loss but inexorably against love.

If I can let go of these shields – the acquired knowledge, the labels, the constructed self – there’s a chance to connect with true intimacy. Something may come of this dance as the Ox and I create each other.  In each moment we can embrace each other.  Or, we can battle for domination over each other.

I see my illusions fused to the Ox and he catches me in his gaze.  “The most living moment,” Rumi says, “comes when those who love each other meet each other’s eyes and in what flows between them then.”  We become transparent to each other and dance as one.

At this stage, still pendulating between desire and intimacy, the connection cannot last.  The Ox pulls off into the mountains of intellectualizing and vanishes into the mists of doubt and ignorance.  It doesn’t matter.  We are caught now, tied by the same love for connection.

Thank you for practicing,

Genju


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first glimpse

by

seeing the Ox

sound of the breeze
in the painted pine ~ 

caught in the paper branches. 

I crumple the sheet
to kindle a fire- 

vow to free you… 

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Sitting in the back of the meditation hall, I watched the dharma teacher walk in.  And I burst into tears.  He talked about his journey to Canada as a (war) refugee and all that it required of him to adapt.  A surgeon in his country, he decided it was too complicated to get his certification to practice in Canada so he opted for manual labour.  After the first day, he limped over to the social welfare office and applied for re-certification as a physician.  The sight of the powerful yet quiet dignity he embodied as he entered the room had brought me to tears. 

It stirred up memories of my father, returning home from the steel mill each evening, body wearied yet wrapped in dignity.  An accountant by profession, he was unemployable in this new country and his soft hands blistered quickly from lifting lengths of harsh metal.  Yet he did what he had to do despite feeling unworthy when measured by the concepts that had once given meaning to his life.  I caught a glimpse of the Ox in the labels that defined these two men in my life.  Again and again, this bovine bodhisattva shows up in the labels that define my own. 

The Ox takes on what I see myself to be.  Infatuated with the idea of who I am, I infuse the Ox with this idea of Me and set off in pursuit.  Sounds of the breeze in sumi-e pines and painted rice cakes:  at this first sighting, the Ox is just another play of ink and fibres.  But oh! how I long to rescue it. 

Thank you for practicing, 

Genju