How on a Monday Morning I Visited Soul through Her Eastern Door

 

Sometimes, or rather more often 

than day admits, 

what we opine, pine, think— 

and what the universe means— 

 

is foam: ephemeral, 

gliding to be rolled 

in spurted rains of mist 

to colossal waves. 

 

So being but a spark, 

a tiny drop, we fathom 

what moves us 

from above, from below, 

 

at times glancing at stars 

we try to map, to plot 

those distant constant lights 

on the face of what we see. 

 

Many strive to rip, to rend 

the common space, its lasting sense; 

some rush to mend the tear, 

repair streaming strings of ancient awe. 

 

Thus we play what we learned, 

practice what we learned to love, 

to hear, to see 

amid ceaseless swirls. 

 

The Chinese 看 (kān) suggests— 

to see and to visit 

may be of the same kith, 

the same ken. 

 

For seeing truly someone, 

or what truly is, 

must be counted 

divine boon, gift: 

 

an intermittent, fragile bridge 

between each passing path 

and life's never-ending resonance. 

 

Sometimes someone we meet
becomes such an opening— 

坎 (kǎn), 

a sill, a door, a window, a lost home. 

 

And even if one is but a drop, 

in that drop, deeper in, 

a staying print: 

刊 (kān), 

 

the ocean, the universe 

you are called to read, 

a font of sacred bliss, of awe, 

ever to be guarded, cared for: 

 

看 (kān), 

and, in this regard, 

even to endure: 

堪 (kān), 

 

transcending 

one's own fleeting drop.