What to write this morning?  There’s Trump-In-Kenosha, the topic of the President’s visit to a place where I have spent some time.  I know very well that I’d write more, what I have said many times before about this man.  I’d recount a litany of lies spoken, words which have nothing to do with Kenosha, or the material plight of the businesses destroyed by the fires of civil unrest.

Or I could write about the Buddhist tradition.  I am interested in Buddhist thought, an approach to living that seems a measured therapeutic response to the disruption caused by physical violence, and the emotional violence of our media saturated time.  The central point of Buddhism: that all that we experience as real, as durable, of substance, — is in fact quite temporary, and is passing away even as we imagine, quite fantastically that we’d like to hold on, and clasp it to ourselves.  This viewpoint is universally true, no exceptions. This glowing screen and keyboard upon which I am writing, a fond cup of mine, purchased from a Waffle House in Kentucky, and the contents, hot astringent coffee, — are all diminishing with the passage of time.  Someday the computer will not function as it does now.  This computer will fail.  The coffee even now grows colder.

My thoughts, they come and they go and are changing all of the time.  I, the ‘enduring’ identity of my unique self — perhaps I should laugh out loud…  I am not the person now at seventy one that I was as twenty one; fifty years of change.  There are a multitude ways that life has changed me, people and experiences which have left their mark as “I” have been buoyed along on the river of time.  If I pause long enough to be honest, just as there was a time before I was born, when I was not, there’s a future time when I will no longer be.

All of this is both directly spoken or implied by the words of the Heart Sutra, the most well known poem of Mahayana Buddhism. The verses consider the impermanence of “reality.”  The longer translation of the title of the poem goes thusly: The Heart of the Wisdom That Passes Over To The Other Shore.  Here are a few lines.

All things are empty:
Nothing is born, nothing dies,
nothing is pure, nothing is stained,
nothing increases and nothing decreases.

…There is no ignorance,
and no end to ignorance.
There is no old age and death,
and no end to old age and death.
There is no suffering, no cause of suffering,
no end to suffering, no path to follow.
There is no attainment of wisdom,
and no wisdom to attain.

The promise of the Heart Sutra is when one “gets it,” sees that every thing is un-enduring then one is released from fear, from underlying anxiety.  One discovers permission to have compassion for one’s self, and for the clash of circumstances and persons….

After all compassion comes from the heart.

In conclusion, this great tune by Cindy Lauper.  The lyric is a story of compassion evoked by the memory of a lover. To see with compassion is greatly to be desired, as all is subject to the passing (away) of time.

If you fall, I will catch you, I’ll be waiting
Time after time

Time After Time

Lying in my bed, I hear the clock tick and think of you
Caught up in circles, confusion is nothing new
Flashback, warm nights almost left behind
Suitcases of memories, time after…

Sometimes you picture me, I’m walking too far ahead
You’re calling to me, I can’t hear what you’ve said
Then you say, “Go slow”, I fall behind
The second hand unwinds

If you’re lost, you can look and you will find me
Time after time
If you fall, I will catch you, I’ll be waiting
Time after time

If you’re lost, you can look and you will find me
Time after time
If you fall, I will catch you, I’ll be waiting
Time after time

After my picture fades and darkness has turned to gray
Watching through windows, you’re wondering if I’m OK
Secrets stolen from deep inside
The drum beats out of time

If you’re lost, you can look and you will find me
Time after time
If you fall, I will catch you, I’ll be waiting
Time after time

You said, “Go slow”, I fall behind
The second hand unwinds

If you’re lost, you can look and you will find me
Time after time
If you fall, I will catch you, I’ll be waiting
Time after time

If you’re lost, you can look and you will find me
Time after time
If you fall, I will catch you, I’ll be waiting
Time after time

Time after time
Time after time
Time after time
Time after time
Time after time
Time after time
Time after
Time after

Writer(s): Cyndi Lauper, Robert Hyman