Day after day I let things go

Why worry about tomorrow today

The fingers of affliction are hard to predict

Wealth and honor don't last

Streamside trails disappear into weeds

Such things are easy for all to see, but no one is willing to look

When birds don't come, the mountain is quiet

3,779 pines keep it dark green

What can you say about profit and fame, to a solitary troubled mountain?

Weeds don't take root in the running water

Ninebark thickets crawl up riparian slopes

Dust seldom falls on moss covered ground

I was twenty-three when I first arrived

How many sunsets have I missed

I was a fighter but I didn't feel fighting so I chose the wilderness for the years that I have left

Scars on my body, lichen of self

Testing my samma

Weighing the words that build or break

Mountain shade and stream light explain the meaning of our practice

Alpine lakes and bird songs reveal the hidden key

Sometimes I sit on top of the ridges, cloud free afternoons

Out of touch with the world's rise and fall

A hot yam fills me up at night

I sit on rocks and watch clouds and let thoughts wander

I bask in sunlight and cultivate silence until someone asks why the somebody did this or that

Then I list the food I ate

Rattlesnakes and wolf packs overrun the world

Everyone has a trick to get ahead

Who knows an anxious frown means try another poem?

Black mountains, green streams

Visits now are up to me

Green and yellow fields of barley and wheat

I lay still in the truck bed, listening to rain

I open the window and doze off watching clouds

Nothing is better than being free

But getting free isn't luck

I move to the cliffs in order to practice

Two or three gnarled white pines cling to piles of nothing

I didn't need others to judge my faults

When natures are simple, old habits end

Whatever is best for her

When thoughts are pure awareness arises

Under heat and pressure

Crystals of affliction nucleate from the slightest impurity

Hone them to an edge and walk it

By chance I found this unclimbed wall

My work pokes through clouds and sky

The loose route cuts through layers of earth

Favor and shame arouse the ambitious

Her intention unearthed another crystal

Dark pines and strange rocks remain unknown for those who look for mind with mind

You're bound to realize if you practice

A rhythm of droplets hollow stone

I sit on rocks in the rain and let thoughts wonder

Wind disrupts the weeping ridgeline

Sunbeams trace the damp brilliance of lichen

Thousands of days, why not spend a few being still