I’ve been thinking about Thich Quang Duc in Saigon in 1963 when Diem’s thugs attacked the monasteries & about the ongoing situation in Burma. James Wimberly catches the moral & political issues clearly in this post at the RBC. I’d go further than Wimberly in my defense of the Vietnamese revolution, but that’s not really the subject of his post . . .
Reading & Writing
Joseph Duemer's blog about reading, writing, politics, birds, food, & weather
SUTRA
They’re shooting monks in Burma again
the next thirty-six hours are critical
I look at their faces on the screen
and though I don’t see mine among them
I see we are all caught up in dreaming
staring at the skulls coming down the streets
reciting the lotus sutra for miles and miles
if even for a moment
I have entered extinction
it will be as though I was
scattering flowers
how much more so
giving a wide berth to arrogant minds
will I respond to your faces with joy.