Now in PDF Format: My Long Life Prayer for His Holiness the Dalai Lama

http://www.dharmadata.org/index2.php?option=com_content&do_pdf=1&id=310

For Isaak.

Isaak…

where have you gone now?

What country are you off to now?

No one will ever you see you again.

But there were many who loved you.

You said you were going to cross the

mountains of rain, defying the border police, arriving

like a secret into Nepal. You said you would hike around

the uncharted valleys for weeks, and then fly into Guatemala

and take down La Policia Nacional. Swedish

brother, donde esta? Para el beneficio de los humanos de la Tierra,

hable una explicación, por favor. Para mi corazón, especialmente. You weren’t that interested in

Tibetan (though you stayed in Rumtek for two months amidst hordes of rainbow-

body droppings and blazings relics), but I’ll say it that way

too: Khyerang kawar yoe? Dzambuling kyi mimang la p’henpa’i chey du, drelshay chik sung roh nang. Migsel

gyi, nga’i nying la p’hen pa’i chey du…

I wish I knew how to say it in

Swedish.

I cried for you yesterday

and today. I looked out over the misty

mountains that you said you were going to cross

and cried.

WHY?

You said that the Swedish were so much

like the Japanese.

A samurai opens the sliding rice-paper door

and sees his clan-brother lying there

– blood-puddles –

hari-kiri.

… NAZE KA…?

There was something to be ashamed of

something to hide from the world.

If this were Japan, the priests

would be chanting at yr. funeral:

“Oh Shariputra!

Form is emptiness,

Emptiness is form…”

(SHARISHI SHIKI FU I KU KU FU I SHIKI…)

I wish that I could give you a proper

Viking funeral

and send you off into twilight

where the rosy-fingered Guatamalan sun

meets the horizon of the rio.

When I first came back from Kathmandu

I saw you at Sonam’s Kitchen

and we talked for about four hours.

I was cold,

You gave me your jacket.

You could talk about everything

and it was all so interesting.

You were kind to everyone

but not kind to yourself.

You learned English from an Irishman

and always said: “…as wull..” (“as well”). You had

an Irish-Swedish accent.

I can’t sleep tonight.

You gave all your money to the pretty

smiling girl at Sonam’s Kitchen, for her schooling.

Sonam gave you a beautiful khatag

before you were “heading off to the

mountains”: it was green, and from a “big lama”, she said.

You cried, and held her for a long time.

I translated something yesterday

and I offer it to you now.

If bodhichitta comes to birth, then in a single instant,

One who’s exhausted in the dungeons of cyclic existence

Is called an heir of the Bliss-Gone Sugatas,

And becomes an object of veneration for the gods and men of the universe.

-Entering into the Conduct of the Bodhisattvas (Bodhicharyavatara), Chapter One, The Benefits of Bodhichitta

“O son of spiritual heritage!…”

O son! My Swedish brother.

“You should know all my teachings as being like a raft…”

(“not to mention non-teachings”)

I could see the angles in your Viking face

so distinctly.

OM MANI PADME HUM.

May all the buddhas and bodhisattvas

guide you safely

to the other shore.

ISAAK HOLMGREN

1975?-2008

my first day in Kathmandu.

I.

Awaken to a rainbow garden

Bedecked with sneaky slits of sunlight

Where butter rains and fills your pores

And the gods put up a good fight.

Awaken to a pond of flowers

Self-arising in its motion

Slowly waving, then just parting

While the frogs rub on some lotion.

II.
Shiva falls into

the deepest Chasm

while National Pride

has a weakening spasm.

No one can get that drugged out

boy to leave our breakfast table.

No one can climb a staircase

in quality quicksand.

There’s no bug or beast that

can raise a limb

and offer a suggestion.

This city is an ongoing web

in the shape of an ever-expanding

oval sphere, inhabited by every

possible sensory pleasure, by every

conceivable suffering; though diffuse,

it can be tasted everywhere.

Brother Self-Arising Star said: it

makes perfect sense that

in holy places there’s

more grime, more seediness, more

evil, because there’s where the

demons come to test out their skills.

I don’t think I’m a demon

but get the feeling with every instant

and occasion

in this place

that it might be good to

try out my skills too.

But the range of needs might be too

vast; I might not have that kind

of utility belt – these kinds of thoughts

cannot hold sway for more than a flash in being-time

or they shall perish my legions of warriors

which emanate from within.

With throbbing pulses of words transforming

resounding silence from inside

transforming words that find their homes

in my heart,

then out towards the sky

That’s how I’ll walk the streets,

talk and bargain with shopkeepers.

It’s a Given;

it streams down even to my feet

and I need it.

Oh i need it.

Kathmandu, Nepal

A Long Life Prayer for His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso

A Long-Life Prayer for His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso

OM AMARANI JIVANTAYE SVAHA!

For the hosts of beings caught in this

prison of projections and hallucinations,

you gently show the path of clearing

away the imprints resulting from dualistic

fixation. Avalokiteshvara, you pour the

nectar of cherishing others on the

seeds of our innate love and compassion.

Lord of Love, the 14th Dalai Lama, may you abide forever,

raining down the showers of true bliss.

OM MANI PADME HUM

Declaring peace and waging non-violence

in a world beset by the evil forces of

fundamentalist ideology and greed, you have made the

actual transmission of awakened mind

blow across the eight directions of the world.

Your example and influence brings tears to

the eyes of those with faith,

and to recall your face of unimaginable

benevolence makes fears scatter like the parting clouds.

Lord of Compassion, the 14th Dalai Lama, may you abide for kalpas upon kalpas,

raining down the showers of true bliss.

OM MANI PADME HUM

Wish-fulfilling Jewel, when the sprouts of

our bodhichitta shoot forth, we must look to you

in gratitude. When the suffering of cyclic

existence is weakened, we must acknowledge

the force of your enlightened intent. When

we at last begin to see the inseparable

nature of dependent arising and emptiness,

we must know that this was after all your

real wish. When the essence nakedly dawns as clear

light, we shall prostrate to you with

bodies as numerous as dust motes.

Lord of Joy, the 14th Dalai Lama, may you abide for aeons,

raining down the showers of true bliss.

OM MANI PADME HUM

Now a dark age has fallen upon the

people of the world. The armies of ignorance

have turned the world into a fortress of confusion.

The armies of attachment have turned the world

into a citadel of avarice. The armies of anger

have turned the world in a maelstrom of hatred.

The armies of jealousy have turned the world into

a machine of competition. The armies of pride

have turned the world into a swamp of conceit.

For the people of this great Earth, and especially for your

subjects of Tibet, summon forth the unexcelled power of

your extraordinary dynamic skill. We pray:

overwhelm the cold forces of negative emotions

with the warm light of your expedient means.

The time has come! Help all beings

to recognize eachother as their mothers and friends.

Lord of Equanimity, the 14th Dalai Lama, may you abide for as long as space endures,

raining down the showers of true bliss!

OM MANI PADME HUM

This prayer of longing for the longevity of the Victorious Precious One, His Holiness Tenzin Gyatso, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, was written on the occasion of His Holiness’ 73rd birthday, a time of much celebration — an auspicious day, at an auspicious place, near the Great Stupa of Jalungkhashor, where all wishes can come true. It was written amongst the playing of Tibetan horns, drums, and other instruments, announcing the presence of victory. It was completed in Darjeeling, where the rain truly showers down (but its bliss is in the eye of the beholder!). May the Dalai Lama live long! May auspiciousness pervade the realms of all beings in all times, and may the nectar of deathlessness wash away the defilements of self-grasping! Sarva Mangalam!

Composed by Erick Sherab Zangpo.

holding your head under water in the bath of concepts.

I am constantly amazed by how many

concepts I can hold inside my mind

at one time. They are all endlessly connected,

overlapping eachother, transparent but capturing,

like the shades of a kaleidoscope, passing

along meaning like a newspaper boy with a

thousand arms — they are really

happening

all at once.

Some Sri Lankan masters of metaphysics

once stated there were 9 movements

of thought in one second — some

Indians thought there were more. The

Chinese said that all these moments

of mind reflected eachother, images

of images coming from all sides of

the fathomless net of awareness. The Japanese said that

moments of thought were Being, and

that Being was moments of thought,

which leaves an endless no-trace.

The Tibetans said that the flow

of concepts was luminosity, a super-

charged search-light of primordial perception, jam-

packed with empty cognizance.

The Thais said it was just impermanence.

Standing inside one of these concepts

is like sitting on a throne inside a raindrop:

regally self-contained, holding together,

you can see all around you, through the

film of that spherical world, but

it’s all blurry. It’s all beautiful,

but it’s all blurry.

(and) that’s just

one. I sit on thrones of thought-metal

in a billion drops of thought-water.

Padmasambhava knew how to make

pretty things out of sky-metal.

He gave them to his favorite girl

& she hid them in some mountains, some rocks,

some mindstreams.

I feel like I’m awakened

but I have no wakefulness. The

Swiss Warrior said to me: “It’s like I’m

enlightened, but I have no light. My

suffering is that I’m always right

but no one listens to me. You need

to learn to be alone, alone with your

self, which doesn’t exist: it’s just

what you think you are, your ego, but

it’s just an illusion.”

My brother once

said to me: “You didn’t accomplish much when you

were young; but at least you realized

that you didn’t exist.”

There is this process

of emptying and filling

that we all go through

on numerous levels.

I sit atop a throne

and see the thought-drops falling.

Darjeeling, West Bengal, India

the most important investigation.

“The rat is time, the tiger is time too.  Living beings are time. Buddhas are time too.
This time witnesses the whole world with three heads and eight arms, it witnesses
the whole world with the sixteen foot tall golden body.”

-Dogen

1.

Leaves are floating all through space

I go but only through your grace.

The emblems point to directions near

Their colors cast aside all fear.

When thoughts arise they light up rooms

Dissolving in a puff: their timeless tomb.

It is the time to blow off steam

The inner heart must join the team.

The itch of longing calls from all sides

I stretch its edges, but still abides.

She hears my murmur and flies on to

The place that she must soon unscrew.

He pulls his text out from a stem

Divides his petals & gives me them.

Leaves are floating all through space:

I go but only through your grace.

2.

Like the sky, thoughts arise

Like clouds, consciousness does not stay.

Thoughts come forth like the sky:

Consciousness does not abide, like clouds…

Like gold, you must check your own

Thoughts, to see if they are real or not.

Like a bird, you must fly around your own

Consciousness, and find the best

LANDING-SPOT OF ATTENTION…

Darjeeling, West Bengal, India

rolling on the inside circumference of the circus sphere.

1.

The trucks that go by are marked like

party vehicles for la Dia de los Muertos.

The wind pampers my face, loosening

my lips so I can smile at the

sky dancers outside. Like a heavy

rain sliding down a stationwagon window

the world outside cascades forever

provoking tidal waves of sensation in

my form. A truck sealed with Shiva’s

face squonks directly in my ear,

announcing the transport of livestock.

The colors are unimaginable

The movement is unhindered.

A procession of trucks and buses rolls on

through — “SPEED CONTROL“, a side

angle of Lord Shiva, Baba Travels and Tours

Unlimited, Bro’s Yatayat, Ganesh like a

Japanese cartoon embracing a lingam with affection,

tired and amazed faces beyond number, wise eyes

painted gaudily below headlights squinting into the distance, gods encased in

plastic cubes for a holding tank of frontal protection: it’s

all so much like a circus

with an elephant god as the ringmaster.

2.

Every circus has its end, but

the show must go on. Dirty

bags of rice are carried on kids’

bicycles, and dust seems to seep up

from the ground like geyser-streams.

A man pushing Royal Everest Ice Cream

on children

makes a score

and squeeks away.

A brick shack standing strong with its

roof held down by rocks, bricks, and at least

seven tires

must be making some kind of proclamation.

Orange sparks of love fly when the

man welds iron scrap together

for some hidden purpose. Young guys

smile at me — it’s hard to know why

I am always so amusing

– aside from the obvious. Bemusement

is always thick in this atmosphere:

even more than dust.

Bus Leaving Kathmandu Going Back to Indi

imprints energetic.

Two months in a cave, prostrating

to the deathless face we know so

well, but forget at almost every moment,

 

he was touched by the lanky hand of

the cotton clad super star, and was 

somehow sanctified. We all need to

go to the caves of our own connection.

We all need to be touched by the glowing

fingertips of inseparability, if only for a

few moments 

(if only for a few chunks of the three times)

 

He was somehow vitalized

in a way that’s

like a hermit crab’s joy on finding

a new landlord of hollowness. I

could intuit a healing like a miracle staged on a platform of direct experience:

a felt-sense rubbed off from cave to

cave throughout endless time

from one cotton clad super star

from one yogic antihero to another

through the space inside the outside of space

and lodged itself firmly in my

organic spheres of perception.

 

It happened like that.

I can apprehend that

this is a power of turning inwards

and a power of imprints energetic

from all those who turned inwards

so long ago and now.

 

The aprons of old Tibetan women

turn round the Stupa…

the most beautiful thing you can *** 

Boudhanath, Kathmandu, Nepal

Homage to Sarasvati.

naked consummation.

I heard that you can

unfold all the ribbons

binding your true nature, one

by one, unravelling them, sometimes

just loosening them a bit, tugging

on their middles and edges,

at times with great force

(but usually with a middling kind of pressure)

and that when those ribbons

are lying of the floor of

non-origination

you can see your true face

and it shines.

It shines.

You can do

this with the fingers of awareness

and the scissors of wisdom,

I heard.

That true face:

maybe it overwhelms the world

like the sun and the moon

coming together

at last.

Boudha, Kathmandu, Nepal