THE TEACHING ON IMPERMANENCE
For the friends of my teacher
Someday, far from now, you hope,
you will be standing at his funeral
torn by a grief so wild you cannot
contain it, staring your own mortality
in its bloody face. With bitter tears
you will remember this:
the tiny inconvenience it would have meant—
a postponed meeting, a little drive—
to put yourself in front of him today
and any day
he was, as usual, offering himself
without reserve.
The luncheon talks
will all be over, the classes
and the long retreats, the noon
gatherings for inquiry and
this deepest nourishment
that humans can offer
one another: to look deeply,
together, into their lives and the
dreadful abyss they cannot face
alone.
Promiscuous, he offers himself
these days
to everyone with open arms.
And everyone he meets moves
even if only for one moment
with that divine fire.
I know you will come over
to where I am standing
smiling and at ease,
and offer your condolences,
and murmur that you wish…
what?
I will be waiting with clear eyes
and the master’s
open hearted, boundless
mind to greet you and to
comfort you, having long ago become
what we have forged
together through all
my years of infinitesimally small
inconveniences
to bring myself fully
into this luminous presence—
just as happily as today
unless, of course, by then
I too have slipped away.
Peg Syverson
October 13, 2008
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