in every direction

By Ryland Shengzhi Li | He/Him/His

Arlington, Virginia | Insight Meditation Community of Washington

in every direction

the sound
of thoughts swishing
steps in grass

at the shrine
of the thousand-limbed
Kannon
a willow oak raises
its ten thousand fingers

wheat harvest
gleaning together
with the sparrows

eating
off the zinnia's disc
the moth
bows his head
in every direction

the bread’s taste
after I learn
who made it

in the lamp-lit temple
the brown-robed propound
cosmic law
outside, I admire
the shimmering Pleiades

tameshigiri
through the rice straw
the sound of birds

stopping to rest
on my backyard bench
autumn leaves
on pilgrimage
to the sea

the sound first published in Modern Haiku 51:2 (2020). at the shrine first published in Presence 68 (2020). wheat harvest first published in Wales Haiku Journal (Aug. 2020). in the lamp-lit temple first published in Eucalypt 28 (2020).

You can find more poems from this author via Instagram @rylandpoetry