lei fraser

I’m concerned about justice. I’m concerned about brotherhood. I’m concerned about truth. And when one is concerned about these, he can never advocate violence. For through violence you may murder a murderer but you can’t murder murder. Through violence you may murder a liar but you can’t establish truth. Through violence you may murder a hater, but you can’t murder hate. Darkness cannot put out darkness. Only light can do that.

~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

I decided this morning, that (when time permits me to) I would search out a random quote, hold it, sit with it, as though it were a pebble that I had found on the beach, and see what rose up from the words (if anything) and write about it. Quite often in the past, I have been struck by a quote – left speechless by the words or another. In some cases, moved to tears, and in other cases barely cared at all. I have been part of and heard many discussions about the usefulness of quotes and quoting – there are many arguments for both, none of which involves what I am doing here. Much like the way I book surf – the selection of a random quote for this thread is just that – completely random. If there is such a thing.

I wonder sometimes, if it is possible to capture everything that a single quote might evoke for someone – in this case me. It is a big challenge for me – to articulate everything that might be triggered by a certain collection of words – and everything else that it connects together for me. I don’t intend to use a quote to prove a point – I have nothing to prove and no point to make. I am interested in my reactions to it (and in the reactions of others to the quote as well). I decided to call this thread ‘notes from the little red box’ because I actually keep my favorite ones in a little red box in my studio. Quite awhile ago – I started writing a similar thread somewhere else – it fell off as my writing tends to do, like a dropped piece of wool while knitting. Now, I find myself going back and returning to that small hole to make the weave complete.

The random quote that came up today is one that is startlingly powerful for me. I admire what Martin Luther King Jr. was working towards, what he stood for and what he ultimately had to sacrifice in order to be heard. Truth, justice and light. These are very powerful allies to have in a world that is becoming more and more consumed by darkness. The timing of this quote is not lost on me either. The theme of using light to put out darkness, rather than darkness to put out darkness is one that is very ‘current’ for me. It came up unexpectedly last night in a conversation with an old friend. I have been thinking about how our reaction to the unknown, to what we fear, to change itself is to use fear to put it out. It seems so often we are in survival mode – fight or flee, that we meet fear with fear, rather than taking any other approach. We accept it as normal. Maybe it is. Maybe it is only because we have allowed it to be. The psychology behind it is interesting – and I believe that to some degree everyone, most of all me, is stuck in survival mode. We are operating out of a place of fear. What makes it worse, for me anyway, is that we KNOW that we are working from this dark place. What keeps us from changing? For me – it is rooted in what is comfortable. The fearful reaction is what has become comfortable – and breaking that pattern is where my work lies. That is where my attention must be, to become more aware of how I react. I used to think that I needed to understand why there is fear in the first place… It is important to know in some ways, but useless knowledge if it doesn’t help me to change. To know hasn’t proved to be enough for me to make the changes, instead, I am finding the changes come from being aware of the fear itself. I may kill what makes me afraid by know it, identifying it, facing it, but it doesn’t kill fear itself – that comes from action. It is in the DOING of things, the act of facing the fear, again and again, until it no longer has a hold, the act of correcting and letting go of negativity, until I am able to relax into myself – that is when the violence of existing ends.

The following poems I wrote two years ago – a different time, slightly different intent, however they come to mind now, as I write:

fate and the violence of existing
cracked
along the ridge
fingers trace
cling
scrape
pull against
the brittle fringe
open open open
and then
nothing
breathe
waves
crash
crash

crash
reverie
a gull screams
to be heard
over the riot
of sand and empty shells
cold and frozen
beneath my feet
closing eyes
notes still play
on the breezes
and thundering wing
cuts past my ear
wait –
take my ears
my heart
my soul
touch me no more
this violence of existing

waves

crash

crash

crash

touch me
no more
the fragile skin
and tear-stained hands
the naked yes
eyes that watch
simply
this world and
the next one
through the window
now turn to see
truth
only stares back

~

II

where are you
hand pressed against
the glass
pushing outward
Where
Are
You
stepped over the broken glass
of yesterday
feet bleeding
because I refused
the comfort
of shoes
the shadows are hiding
and I am caught
between them
shouting into the mirror
for you
for you
screaming your name
into the wind
where
and then nothing
get out
pressing or leaving
my palm print here
nothing but the shattering
and crashing
of nothing
stillness
still screams louder
waiting inside myself
to be free
this violence
provoked
by breathing
sitting here
in this
existence

~

22.03.06.
Leigh Tyson

III

you ask
why
and I only
stare
in return

~

postmortem

fate
unfolds only
in paper
my own creases
folded corners
created
out of a blank page
flowers and cranes
folded
refolded
fingers littered
with cuts
little slice
inflection
reflection
refraction
lay them
in rows to float
on the river
of myself
as the violence of existing
fades in the ripples
of the water’s
quiet embrace
~

22.03.06

Now, I quietly embrace the night, and everyone here. I will continue rooting through and finding whatelse might lie in this little red box of mine… May tomorrow bring the truth, the death of fear and much light and love to you all. May we all be filled with the courage required to meet our fears and relax into ourselves. May we all be free.

🙂

Leigh-Anne

15.01.08

am home from work this afternoon early, because my daughter has the flu. It’s been a busy week, because the virus has made its way first through my oldest daughter, then has started with me, and now my youngest. Despite feeling under the weather, my little one, who is currently laying on the sofa near by, resting, felt the sudden urge to sing. Not a common song, or a current pop one from the radio, but one that she made up on the spot – about an ordinary every day event. It made me smile, and then got me to thinking about how beautiful children are. They are for many many reasons, but in particular today, children are beautiful for me because they can create something wondeful out of something that appears to be quite mundane and ordinary… they, in general, make the world delightful and extraordinary. The shortest song even, about something as simple as a spoon, was enough to make her laugh a little extra, and made me smile. On a day when we are both feeling run down, it was just the right thing to lift our spirits. It is why I delight in the ordinary.

Now, what comes to mind is a Zen story about tea:

Bodhidharma’s eyelids and the origins of tea

Awareness comes through sensitivity. You have to be more sensitive whatsoever you do, so that even a trivial thing like tea… Can you find anything more trivial than tea? Can you find anything more ordinary than tea? No, you cannot–and Zen monks and masters have raised this most ordinary thing into the most extraordinary. They have bridged “this” and “that”… as if tea and God have become one.

Unless tea becomes divine you will not be divine, because the least has to be raised to the most, the ordinary has to be raised to the extraordinary, the earth has to be made heaven. They have to be bridged, no gap should be left.
Tea was discovered by Bodhidharma, the founder of Zen. The story is beautiful. He was meditating for nine years, facing a wall. Nine years, just facing the wall, continuously, and sometimes it was natural that he might start falling asleep.

He fought and fought with his sleep–remember, the metaphysical sleep, the unconsciousness. He wanted to remain conscious even while asleep. He wanted to make a continuity of consciousness–the light should go on burning day and night, for twenty-four hours. That’s what dhyana is, what meditation is–awareness.

One night he felt that it was impossible to keep awake; he was falling asleep. He cut his eyelids off and threw them! Now there was no way for him to close his eyes.

The story is beautiful. To get to the inner eyes, these outer eyes will have to be thrown. That much price has to be paid. And what happened? After a few days he found that those eyelids that he had thrown on the ground had started growing into a small sprout. That sprout became tea.

That’s why when you drink tea, something of Bodhidharma enters you and you cannot fall asleep. Bodhidharma was meditating on the mountain called T’a, that’s why it is called tea. It comes from that mountain where Bodhidharma meditated for nine years.

This is a parable. When the Zen Master says, “Have a cup of tea,” he’s saying, “Taste a little of Bodhidharma. Don’t bother about these questions, whether God exists or not, who created the world, where is heaven and where is hell and what is the theory of karma and rebirth.”

When the Zen Master says, “Forget all about it. Have a cup of tea,” he’s saying, “Better become more aware, don’t go into all this nonsense. This is not going to help you at all.”
~

the other saying that comes to mind is – Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water, after enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. ~ Wu Li

🙂

la

November 30, 2007

I wish, on some days, that someone was with me while I was alone, to ask me what I am thinking about… not because it is anything important or profound… but because sometimes I miss having someone around to tell. Today, driving home, I was watching the sunrays coming through the clouds. There has been the promise of rain and the clouds finally arriving give the hope that it will in fact rain. As I drove, I thought about what it would be like to be in one of those rays of sun. I see them falling in straight lines from the sky, and often wonder where they land – like I do when I see a rainbow… what if I were in one of those sunrays? Could I be so lucky? Likely not…  I don’t have much luck with things like that – it is more likely to be on the edge watching, and appreciating anyone who could be a part of that experience…

Seeing the sunlight through the clouds made me think also of how we (generally) tend to associate those rays with that of an image of the divine, of God in particular. I am sure with some research I could find out why – there are probably countless references to radiant light in the Bible alone, let alone the associations that we have created ourselves… I can remember one of the first times that I, personally, began making the association. Well, when I consciously made the connection.

Once was when I was a small child. I remember being 5 or so and sitting in church on a Sunday morning. It was an old country church that sat (and still sits) at the crossroads of a then dirt road and highway (now I think all the roads are paved) – an old Anglican Church. I sat and watched the sun pour in through the stained glass windows, mesmerized by the colours that the glass gave the light, and the streams that were created with the dust particles that floated in the air. It felt at the time that beauty itself had stepped into the pew beside me – and I decided that it must be God who had come to listen to the music too. From that day onward, I connected those kinds of moments with someone/ something greater than myself – though I will admit, as I got older I have thought less and less of being next to God, like he was a playmate coming to sit near me but more aware of how God touches the life and lives around me. How God is in and around all things, all people, including me… A shift in perspective that came with age, I suppose.

The sunrays through the clouds today, reminded me of that same hope and comfort… the kind that exists without philosophy or ideas or labels, it just is… It has come to represent for me, the hope of my childhood, which I have never lost –  that feeling of comfort sitting there with God in the pew as a five year old… innocent, happy and surrounded by something beautiful. Most of all, the rays of light reminded me of the kind of beauty that can only be experienced. It can’t be recreated or reproduced the same way. You just have to be there, and breathe it in.  I think that is why I wished to be inside the ray of light, as much as I wish to have someone next to me to share that thought with at the time.

In the end, it is a comfort that somewhere, perhaps almost everywhere at any time, there is that possibility to see the rays of light from the sun – and that connection is a brilliant one.

la

November 15, 2007

He who binds to himself a joy
Does the winged life destroy;
But he who kisses the joy as it flies
Lives in Eternity’s sunrise.

~ William Blake

Sitting on top of a boulder
The gorge stream icy cold
Quiet fun holds a special charm
Fogged-in on deserted cliffs
A fine place to rest
The sun leans and tree shadows sprawl
While I view the ground of my mind
A lotus comes out of the mud.

– Cold Mountain

Reaching my hut built of quiet mystery,
I sweep clouds away and settle into repose.
There’s no one left to climb with me beyond
Slippery moss and frail vines to this peak
Where autumn winds bluster and breeze
And spring grasses grow lush and green.
You’re traveling beyond hope of return.

– Hsieh Ling-yun