Contentment

By Justine C. Tajonera

"I learn only to be contented."
- poem inscribed on a tsukubai in the Ryoanji Temple

An extraordinary life
is not impossible.
It consists of
extraordinary
moments.

I have learned that
contentment has
nothing to do with
coin
but everything to
do with
what is
spent.

The buds in
the orchard
and the deer
roaming the park
pay no taxes,
earn no living
and yet live fully
before the seasons
or the predator
takes
away.

I have no reason
not to live
extraordinarily.

(March 13, 2010)
Kyoto
Image of a deer in Nara from http://www.flickr.com/photos/mlog/3036701485/

This was a reflection after seeing the deer of Nara, living on the streets and the parks, oblivious of humanity's pace and concerns. This world, except for humans, does not worry about the invention called money.

I connected this to what I realized in the Ryoanji Temple. There is a famous rock garden there and a tsukubai (or small basin provided in Japanese Buddhist temples for visitors to purify themselves by the ritual washing of hands and rinsing of the mouth) that has a wise poem inscribed on it, "I learn only to be contented." The original poem literally translates as "I know only plenty." Another way of saying it is "What one has is all one needs."

The Pauper, The Prince and The Poet

By Justine C. Tajonera

"Whosoever is delighted in solitude is either a wild beast or a god." - Francis Bacon

If poverty meant solitude
and solitude meant
beast-like or
god-like
existence,
then the poet
would be a
pauper.

If abundance meant solitude
and solitude meant
beast-like or
god-like
existence,
then the poet
would be a
prince.

Or are there three
people in this story:
the pauper, the prince and
the poet?

For to be a poet,
would it not mean that
he is both pauper
and prince?

Does the weight of a leaf
and the grief
it signifies
have anything to do
with the observer's
pocket?

What would afford
a poet her
vision?

Would it be the lack
or the glut
of coin?

I turn the question
around and around
in my head:

there is no answer.

There is a word for
pauper, for prince
and for poet.

Each one has a meaning
and each one is
meaningless
if I so
choose.

(Jan. 9, 2010)

Image from http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Prince_and_the_Pauper_1881_p20.jpg