Hell is not punishment,
it's training.
Shunryu Suzuki

The most important thing is to find out
what is the most important thing.
Shunryu Suzuki

Well versed in the Buddha way,
I go the non-Way
Without abandoning my
Ordinary person's affairs.

The conditioned and
Name-and-form,
All are flowers in the sky.

Nameless and formless,
I leave birth-and-death.
Layman P'ang (740-808)

Nobly, the great priest
deposits his daily stool
in bleak winter fields
Buson

The monkey is reaching
For the moon in the water.
Until death overtakes him
He'll never give up.
If he'd let go the branch and
Disappear in the deep pool,
The whole world would shine
With dazzling pureness.
Hakuin

A world of dew,
and within every dewdrop
a world of struggle
Issa

The past is already past.
Don't try to regain it.
The present does not stay.
Don't try to touch it.

From moment to moment.
The future has not come;
Don't think about it
Beforehand.

Whatever comes to the eye,
Leave it be.
There are no commandments
To be kept;
There's no filth to be cleansed.

With empty mind really
Penetrated, the dharmas
Have no life.

When you can be like this,
You've completed
The ultimate attainment.
Layman P'ang (740-808)

Just stop your wandering,
Look penetratingly into your inherent nature,
And, concentrating your spiritual energy,
Sit in zazen
And break through.
Bassui

Cast off what has been realized.
Turn back to the subject
That realizes
To the root bottom
And resolutely
Go on.
Bassui

Look directly!
What is this?
Look in this manner
And you won't be fooled!
Bassui

1. Experience Chan! It's not mysterious.
As I see it, it boils down to cause and effect.
Outside the mind there is no Dharma
So how can anybody speak of a heaven beyond?

2. Experience Chan! It's not a field of learning.
Learning adds things that can be researched and discussed.
The feel of impressions can't be communicated.
Enlightenment is the only medium of transmission.

3. Experience Chan! It's not a lot of questions.
Too many questions is the Chan disease.
The best way is just to observe the noise of the world.
The answer to your questions?
Ask your own heart.

4. Experience Chan! It's not the teachings of disciples.
Such speakers are guests from outside the gate.
The Chan which you are hankering to speak about
Only talks about turtles turning into fish.

5. Experience Chan! It can't be described.
When you describe it you miss the point.
When you discover that your proofs are without substance
You'll realize that words are nothing but dust.

6. Experience Chan! It's experiencing your own nature!
Going with the flow everywhere and always.
When you don't fake it and waste time trying to rub and polish it,
Your Original Self will always shine through brighter than bright.

7. Experience Chan! It's like harvesting treasures.
But donate them to others.
You won't need them.
Suddenly everything will appear before you,
Altogether complete and altogether done.

8. Experience Chan! Become a follower who when accepted
Learns how to give up his life and his death.
Grasping this carefully he comes to see clearly.
And then he laughs till he topples the Cold Mountain ascetics.

9. Experience Chan! It'll require great skepticism;
But great skepticism blocks those detours on the road.
Jump off the lofty peaks of mystery.
Turn your heaven and earth inside out.

10. Experience Chan! Ignore that superstitious nonsense
That makes some claim that they've attained Chan.
Foolish beliefs are those of the not-yet-awakened.
And they're the ones who most need the experience of Chan!

11. Experience Chan! There's neither distance nor intimacy.
Observation is like a family treasure.
Whether with eyes, ears, body, nose, or tongue -
It's hard to say which is the most amazing to use.

12. Experience Chan! There's no class distinction.
The one who bows and the one who is bowed to are a Buddha unit.
The yoke and its lash are tied to each other.
Isn't this our first principle... the one we should most observe?

Master Xu Yun

Good and evil have no self nature;
Holy and unholy are empty names;
In front of the door is the land of stillness and quiet;
Spring comes, grass grows by itself.
Master Seung Sahn

Tokusan

If you have never taken
The principles of the teachings to heart,
You have no basis
For awakening to the hidden path.
Kuei-shan Ling-yu

Whether you are going or staying or sitting or lying down,
the whole world is your own self.
You must find out
whether the mountains, rivers, grass, and forests
exist in your own mind or exist outside it.
Analyze the ten thousand things,
dissect them minutely,
and when you take this to the limit
you will come to the limitless,
when you search into it you come to the end of search,
where thinking goes no further and distinctions vanish.
When you smash the citadel of doubt,
then the Buddha is simply yourself.
Daikaku

When mortals are alive, they worry about death.
When they're full, they worry about hunger.
Theirs is the Great Uncertainty.

But sages don't consider the past.
And they don't worry about the future.
Nor do they cling to the present.
And from moment to moment they follow the Way.
Bodhidharma

There are thousands upon thousands of students
who have practised meditation and obtained its fruits.
Do not doubt its possibilities because of the simplicity of the method.
If you can not find the truth right where you are,
where else do you expect to find it?

Dogen

first on a track
night spider webs
catch my face
Yao Feng (Tasmania)

troubled night
no resting place
for my thoughts
Phil Adams

A cross-legged monk
Silent awareness
A battle for peace.

The cry of a child
The cry of an ambulance
The cry of a newborn.

Yellow young spring
Sky full of hope
Future won't come.

Frenzy of insects
Heat of our star
The past has dissolved.

Red humid forest
Light rays in fog
Shattering silence.

Black naked trees
White topping of snow
A perfect year gone.

A dinner with friends
Love, laughter and trust
Dukkha disguised.

Grasping attachment,
Insisting on trouble:
My life as a fool.

Grasping a Path,
Insisting on my view:
My life as a fool.

Grasping, Insisting:
Fool.

Schoolyard with children
Shameless screaming and fun
When did I loose that?

Thundering silence
Colorful darkness
Wanting to be free

With metta to act
With wisdom to be
The struggle to end.

All is so many
All is but One
None.

Who am I?
Am I?
Am?
.