#24 MISSISSIPPI!

 SUGAR MAGNOLIA!    I had a warm and sweet time at the Magnolia Grove Meditation Practice Center in Batesville, Mississippi.  Even the Zoom intro page says 'Relax, there is nothing to do, the program will begin shortly.'   One of the larger monasteries and practice centers under Tich Nath Hanh in the US, including Deer Park in California and Blue Cliff in New York.  

About 40 folks joined for meditation, mindfulness and breakout groups.  I felt quite welcomed, and in fact, there were a lot of 'zoomers' from other parts of the country.  Today's meditation was led by Jenny Pittman and Tony Mills of Australia's Order of Interbeing (Tich Nath Hanh affiliated sanghas), as the primary group leader was on retreat.  

The program began with 'acknowledgment of First Peoples' reading, which recognizes the ancestors of the land we now inhabit, certainly an ongoing issue for what is known as Australia and what we now call the United States. 

A 40 minute guided meditation followed with some lovely instructions, such as to simply notice if breathing is quiet and peaceful or very busy.   I also really liked "Being busy you may have forgotten your body."

After meditation we broke out into groups on the subject of our benefactors.  Jenny asked us to consider who has helped us.  That could be a teacher, a parent, or anyone.  "Poets, for instance," she said, "remind us to look at the world closely, to awaken, to stretch our imagination."   

There are, it seems, no accidents.  It was two days ago that our beloved poetry teacher in Bucks County, Chris Bursk, passed away.   Just then he settled in my heart as one of my great benefactors. He allowed us to write the unspeakable, to touch the language of everything.  

Ashes, Ashes, We All Fall Down by Christopher Bursk

If I’m going to be ashes in a decade or so,
why stay up past midnight staring at the television
as if it might have a change of heart
and put a third-party candidate in office for once
or end the war, and, while it was at it, clear up my grandson’s acne?

Maybe I should just enjoy the dog’s howling next door.
All night it’s been tugging at its chain
as if the links might finally get bored with being metal and snap.

If I’m going to be incinerated — burnt to a crisp —
in roughly 3,650 days, why am I sulking
because this morning of all mornings my car tired of doing
the same thing it had done the morning before,
and because half my class chose not to show up for a lecture that
I, their professor, a year from retirement, had hoped
would change their entire outlook
on comma splices? 

Once I’m ashes drifting away on the water,
what will it matter that years ago I threw up on my senior-prom date,
or last week forgot my wife’s sixty-first birthday,
or this morning embarrassed my grandson in front of his friends?

How do any of us prepare for the future
when we’re so busy making a mess
of the present? Perhaps this is time’s truest revenge:
to make us aware of its passing, every minute
of every day. Approximately 5,256,000 minutes

from now — give or take a month or year or two —
my son is going to stand on a bridge
with his children and do something he never thought
he’d have to do: let his quirky,
annoying, yet lovable (I’d hoped!) father slip through his fingers.

That’s my only comfort: I will be ashes
so fine they won’t even question the rocks
they fall on, the creek that sweeps them away.

For once I’ll not embarrass anyone.
For once I’ll not have to worry
about whether I’m doing something right.
I’ll perform the one miracle of my life.