That's what the Tibetans call it, when you try to force your delusions on objective reality.
You find a snake. It's an animal; it should have legs. But where are they? It has no hair in which to hide them, no feathers, no shell.
Well, they must be inside.
So you squeeze. I picture the unoffending reptile, coiling around my wrist: bug-eyed, silent, indignant.
You want it to have legs. You'd feel better if it had legs. You insist it have legs. In the end, you'd rather it were dead, than to go on existing without legs.
But the thing is, it has no legs.
And that's only a problem for you.
(From Rough Around the Edges [manuscript in progress]. Photo of Epicrates cenchria, the rainbow boa, courtesy of Rawpixel.com and a generous photographer.)
"Zoos are full, prisons are overflowing... how the world still dearly loves a cage."
Maude.
– From lifelong favourite Harold and Maude, which entire movie has an atmosphere I would later recognise as the precise texture of Zen koans and stories.
"Why not kill yourself?" asked the monk
"No place to start," said Caoshan.
(Photo courtesy of Chris Fuller and Unsplash.com.)
Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil.
Exodus 23:2
(Photo of Fudo Myō-ō statue courtesy of Wikimedia Commons and a generous photographer.)
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(Garlands of old man's beard [Usnea longissima], catching the winter sun at this specific moment of day.)
I practice the religion that suits me.
The one that says I'm right and you're wrong.
That I'm the ideal, and you the mistake.
We all do that.
Except the most lost,
Who commit the sin their sanghas condone
In full knowledge.
(Photo courtesy of MC1 Chad J. McNeeley, the United States Navy, and Wikimedia Commons.)
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