I came from brilliancy
And return to brilliancy
What is this?

~Last Poem by Honshin who had to die in order to show his deciples what a Zen Master is capable of.

So this is how i will start . As a person with little HTML understanding, you will have to bear with me. Honshin asks the universal question. His answer to it, apparently, was KAAAA! and then he croaked. Very Leonine. This is the Month of March, which usually comes in like a Lion and goes out like a lamb. I don't think Honshin would have approved. How is March going out this year? With a great big kaboom, at least in the Middle East. Out here in the middle west, its pretty decent, though tonight we had a thunderstorm. I am sitting here at my computer which my little book, Zen Flesh, Zen Bones, (compiled by Paul Reps and Nyogen Senzaki) comtemplating the sources of brilliancy, and wondering what the hell this is.

For those who study Zen, brilliancy is beyond the here and now, but in order to reach it, you have to go through the here and now with great honor and dedication, with no thought for oneself. It is a warrior religion. There are little stories in the book about monks who give up everything and live the acetic life. Ryokan, a much mentioned Zen Master, gave a thief the clothes off his back so that he would not leave his hut empty handed. I am thinking about all those weekend warriors i used to see roaming the highways of my beautiful state. Did they know they too, might have to give up everything willingly to answer the call of war? War is perhaps the meanest thief of all, since it can steal your life and your honor. Are those soldiers thinking of themselves right now? I hope so in some way, i want them to be aware enough not to get shot, but i also want them to act with honor and dedication. Everyone should feel good enough about their life that they can go out with a 'KAAAA!' . Not yet though. Later, when they are old men and women bumping grandchildren on their knees.

I see lightening out there. Time to go.