Clear Water Of Consciousness

A Wood in Sound The pine tree sways in the smoke, Which streams up and up. There’s a wood in sound.

My legs lose themselves Where the river mirrors daffodils Like faces in a dream.

A cold wind and the white memory Of a sasanqua Warm rain comes and goes.

I’ll wait calmly on the bank Till the water clears And willows start to bud.

Time is singed on the debris Of air raids. Somehow, here and now, I am another.

Shinkichi Takahashi is considered a master poet in Japan. His 20th century work is regarded as Zen discipline. Subjective thought is buried in the confusion that spins around the conscious mind. But the conscious mind digs through its own rubble, and exposes the inner self. That self dusts itself off and shouts in unheard syllables. The vibration of this unity catapults through the complete psyche, and this incredible interaction gives credence to our physical manifestations.

We think the conscious mind and the inner self are at war thanks to our belief in the power of superficial exterior stimuli. Takahashi explains that one self waits for the other as we imagine our physical experiences. The conscious mind is the vehicle the inner self or soul uses to feel itself physically. Our conscious and unconscious beliefs form our reality. Some of our conscious beliefs are singed debris. They are the fallout from external air raids that influence our feelings and imagination.

Beliefs automatically attract appropriate emotions. Beliefs are reinforced through our imagination, and they cause the body to react in certain ways. Our personal relationships, our body and its condition, and our environment are the result of this fallout. The conscious mind perceives the fallout and our ego detects the presence of our inner self. Somehow, in the here and now, we become conscious willows that start to bud in our own clear water of individual consciousness.