My True Names

Good Morning!

I simply want to share a poem that beautifully captures the dharma (knowledge/spirit) of Buddhism. On occasions when I fail to see the interconnections between us all I read this to myself. I hope it captures something for each of you as it has for me on many occasions. Have a great day and love thy self and neighbor as one, for they are.

Peace and Love, Jim

Please Call Me by My True Names Do not say that I'll depart tomorrow -- for even today I still arrive.

Look deeply: I arrive in every second to be a bud on a spring branch, to be a tiny bird, with still fragile wings, learning to sing in my new nest, to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower, to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.

I still arrive, in order to laugh and to cry, in order to fear and to hope.

The rhythm of my heart is the birth and death of all that are alive.

I am the mayfly metamorphosing on the surface of the river, And I am the bird, that swoops down to swallow the mayfly.

I am the frog swimming happily in the clear water of a pond, and I am also the grass-snake that silently feeds itself on the frog.

I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones, my legs as thin as bamboo sticks, And I am the arms Merchant, selling deadly weapons to Uganda.

I am the twelve-year-old girl, refugee on a small boat, who throws herself into the ocean after being raped by a sea pirate. And I am the pirate, my heart not yet capable of seeing and loving.

My joy is like spring, so warm it makes flowers bloom all over the Earth. My pain is like a river of tears, so vast it fills the four oceans.

Please call me by my true names, so I can hear all my cries and laughter at once, so I can see that my joy and pain are one.

Please call me by my true names, so I can wake up, and so the door of my heart can be left open, the door of compassion.