This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. So I am quite honored to be here this morning and to gather with you and to consider... how we can most deeply and fully and surprisingly honor not only of the dead, but the living and the commitment to protect and nurture life. So it's really wonderful to be here. For many years, both here at San Francisco Zen Center and then in the wider community, what we call the floating sangha.

[01:04]

Outside of our different places of practice, there is a floating sangha of practitioners. And for many, many years, working closely with Zen teacher Thich Nhat Hanh, he loved to remind us that we are actually all veterans, every single one of us. And he said, those who serve as true veterans are the light at the tip of the candle. This morning, as Lauren lit the candle out in the wider hall before coming in here, I watched the fire take hold and remembered that statement that we're all veterans, light at the tip of the candle in dark times. and thinking about what that means and what it means to celebrate, to commemorate a holy day, a holiday.

[02:10]

My friend Martha DeBaros, who works every week, goes to San Quentin prison where many of the practitioners who join to teach meditation and mindfulness practice are coming together today at San Quentin for an opportunity to meet with the men that they and their partners want to get to meet. So there's a celebration today. I like to think it's in honor of Memorial Day, remembering what it takes to be courageous, even locked down in prison. So my friend Martha reminded me that this day in particular, Memorial Day, which is the first, we say really the beginning of summer or the summer vacation that ends on Labor Day. We've made this holiday such a civilian experience and lost, somewhat lost, the old gravitas of what the day originally signified.

[03:19]

So I want to return to that. She actually said, come back to that. Talk about that. She's been bringing that up in meditation at San Quentin with the men she works with there, because many of them are combat veterans. And at least they've experienced a kind of combat. So a call to redeem our holidays, to give... real strong and true and refreshed meaning to what actually happens on the last Monday of the month. And then to see that not only on the last Monday of the month do we have a chance to remember and to come back. But if we can, and as we do, practice mindfulness and deep remembering on this special day, then that mindfulness serves as a kind of cellular memory that informs and inoculates our being so that we carry the capacity to hold gravity and levity, sinking down and looking deeply and getting up and serving very lightly and fully in our lives.

[04:43]

So there's a call. You know that traditionally we just... It was wonderful studying this. I love to study. It's the greatest honor. I can't believe, I'm so grateful to be able to come here today and to be forced to study in preparation to meet you, to really look into the old story of what Memorial Day is. So, Decoration Day, remembering close to one million people who have died in this country in service. And traditionally, the day began in, it was proclaimed in 1968 by General John Logan of the Union Army as a day to remember the dead of the Civil War. Did I say? Oh, I'm so sorry, this is, I've got to go back to my studies. I'm so sorry, 1868, pardon me.

[05:47]

1868, General John Logan, a call to remember those who had died in the Civil War. And of course, right away, there was a separation. Yes, we'll honor the Union dead. And yes, we'll honor the Confederate dead, but we'll honor on a different day, especially since a Union soldier has proclaimed this day. So for the first... Number of years there was that kind of bifurcation, separation, a kind of staunch taking of a stance. Until that began to fade away and the day blended into one deep celebration of a life in service. And Decoration Day for decorating the graves, going to the graves and laying flowers on the graves. and remembering the dead, and for the first half of the day from dawn until noon, the flag flying at half-staff to remember the dead, remember this day.

[06:53]

And you know, for years, practicing with Thich Nhat Hanh, we, rather than taking, well, we very deliberately chose Memorial Day and Veterans Day as the two holy days, holidays, when we gather together, when we gather, and this has been going on for 20 years, it's happening today as we speak, the mindfulness retreat, the annual mindfulness retreat, we do two a year, is happening on this day in Mariposa, north of here, in the sunlight celebration and remembering. And then every year also on Veterans Day, the 11th day of November, remembering and spending the day writing, telling the stories and listening, deep listening. So choosing those two days as the hip bones of remembering. And there is a tradition of this, of remembering to decorate and come down and be in the presence of, as someone Roshi likes to say, the great majority.

[08:03]

The great majority. Come into the graveyards. be present with the great majority. In 1865, right before the proclamation of this day, and not long, right at the end, toward the end of the Civil War, in Charleston, South Carolina, freedmen gathered in an encampment that had been serving as a temporary Confederate prison and a mass grave of the Confederate and Union dead. And in that celebration of the end of war and the first taste of freedom, the bodies in that mass grave were exhumed and reburied properly, and the graves were decorated. Close to 10,000 citizens, mostly African-American former slaves, gathering there, 2,800 children,

[09:08]

laying flowers on the new graves. It is good and right to remember where we come from and what we're made of. Right away, I think of my father, who was a pilot in the Second World War. And this morning, I put on our family altar a photograph of my parents who married right at the end, in February, Valentine's Day, 1946, I think, right toward the end of the Second World War, my father in uniform, so young, looking right into the camera, my mother carrying within her the secret of secrets, so the marriage was necessary. And... And there are people in this room today carrying within the secret of secrets.

[10:13]

We dedicate our work and our life to the unfolding of the secret of life and the meaning of the great majority listening in. So my father was marked by the Second World War. I remember him, I remember sometimes at night waking up and he would be downstairs in the dark playing the piano I felt that all of his life he carried a kind of sadness that was actually marked by his years of service and what he saw. And I remember when I was a young woman, my father making the decision to, during the upwelling of the Vietnam War, making the decision to leave his life as a publisher in New York City and to do a full-time draft. counseling and resistance work and I remember long before I began to practice meditation a copy of Thich Nhat Hanh's book Lotus in a Sea of Fire on our dining room table my father studying that book having it helped him take in the gravity of what he knew so in a way this day is a tribute to to those who

[11:38]

to the things they carried and to the truth they know. And years, years later, when I first met Thich Nhat Hanh here, actually, at Zen Center at Green Gulch, and was part of a huge peace march in New York City in the early, let's see, when was it? Early, right around 19... 81, 82, peace march in New York City, marching to the United Nations to ask for world peace. And there was a contingency marching with Thich Nhat Hanh, and I remember that that group was slowed down by this fierce and gentle monk from Vietnam who reminded us of how quickly we'd move through his country. And to really make peace means slowing down, really slowing down. And so pulling back and causing slow steps, a lot of confusion and upset because the march was peaceful and joyful and vigorous.

[12:52]

And then this small, powerful monk from Vietnam was holding up the trap. And many of the leaders from this community were present in that march, some of the leaders. And it was a very powerful experience to slow down and actually feel the gravity of war. So I've been studying recently the edicts of Emperor Ashoka. And in the current issue of Tricycle Magazine, there's a beautiful tribute to Emperor Ashoka from the third century before the Common Era, an emperor who made the vow to uphold the world after causing great carnage in southern India. Standing on the hill of Daoli in southeastern India, the site of a massive battle in

[14:03]

261 years before the Common Era, where under King Ashoka's command, 100,000 were slaughtered. The armies, his armies going against Kalinga. And in the flowing of blood on the ground, something inside of this emperor turned and he took up the teachings of the Buddha and erected some 40 pillars spanning the landscape from Kandahar, Afghanistan, which is the current capital of the Taliban, from Kandahar, Afghanistan, to India, southern India, and east into Bangladesh. Multi-ethnic, multi-cultural. stone edicts.

[15:05]

The king declares an apology and a debt to all beings. Let me read to you. In the third century, the great Buddhist emperor Ashoka of India, following a noble example of tolerance and understanding, honored and supported all other religions in his vast empire. In one of those edicts carved on rock, the original of which one may read even today, the emperor declared, one honors not only one's religion and condemns the religion of others, but honors others' religions for this or that or all reasons. So doing, one helps all religion to grow and renders service. In acting otherwise, one digs the grave of one's own religion and also does harm to other religions.

[16:09]

Whosoever honors their own religion and condemns other religions does so indeed through devotion, thinking I will glorify my own religion, but on the contrary, in so doing, injures his or her own religion more gravely. So concord is good. Let all listen and be willing to listen to the doctrines professed by others. Honor one another's religion. And then just a little bit more, because I do think this is wonderful to remember on this occasion of Decoration Day. It is a consolation and inspiration, writes Svalpola Rahula, in What the Buddha Taught. It is a consolation and inspiration to think today that at least there was one great ruler well-known in history who had the courage, confidence, vision to apply teaching of nonviolence, peace, and love to the administration of a vast empire in both internal and external affairs.

[17:29]

At first, following the example of his father and grandfather and wishing to complete the conquest of the Indian Peninsula, King Ashoka invaded and conquered Kalinga and annexed it. Hundreds of thousands were killed, tortured, taken prisoner. Later, when he became a Buddhist and took up the teachings of the Buddha, he was completely changed and transformed. Referring to the conquest of Kalinga, the emperor publicly expressed on a stone pillar his complete repentance, how extremely painful it was for him to think on that carnage. He publicly declared that he would never again draw his sword for any conquest, but wish that all living beings know nonviolence, self-control, the practice of serenity and mildness.

[18:31]

This, of course, considered the chief conquest by the beloved of the gods, as King Ashoka was known. Nor did he only renounce war himself. He expressed his desire and conviction that my sons and grandsons and daughters and granddaughters will not think of a new conquest as worth achieving. Let them instead think of that conquest, only which is the conquest by piety. This is good for the world and for the world beyond. So... I mean, this was an extraordinary time in the life of India when the edicts emphasized justice as fair, just, efficient, legal system... Assured were protections for the poor, the aged, for prisoners, religious tolerance for all practitioners, restraint, frugality, abstention from violent action, and charity, which included public hospitals for all, including animals, public hospitals for animals, and a proclaimed commitment not to eat animal flesh.

[19:55]

Of course, maybe it didn't last. The public hospitals lasted after King Ashoka's reign. But many of these admonitions faded as the next monarch took hold. But it is good to remember that not only was the teaching of the Buddha experienced and carried by cloud and water wanderers, but also by kings and leaders, world leaders. I had a wonderful talk with a friend and fellow practitioner, Chris Fortin, who's one of the teachers and leaders in the everyday Zen community, a person who trained here and is deeply involved in practice here at the San Francisco Zen Center, part of a wonderful organization, the San Francisco Zen Center is supporting Honoring the Path of the Warrior, which is a program that Chris and Lee, who also trained here at Green Dolch League Clinger, are doing this wonderful path of practice with veterans, bringing home and honoring the path of the warrior.

[21:08]

And Chris... told me about traveling as a young woman through Afghanistan into India and remembering those pillars and marveling long before she began practice what this would mean for the world if we could really erect monuments to peace in our world. So this is a good day to remember. And connected... Very much connected to this time for me is recently, a few weeks ago, my daughter graduated from the University of California at Berkeley and sitting in the Greek theater celebrating the 148th graduating class, watching her receive a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Economics and Policy and listening, deeply listening to Amory Lovins, who's been a primary teacher for the San Francisco Zen Center community in the early years coming and thinking together with many of us long before he was known for the brilliant and extraordinary founder of the Rocky Mountain Institute and the work that he's done worldwide for energy and the nonviolent protection of the world, the world's energy sources.

[22:28]

So to see Amory Lovins there on the stage of the Greek theater surrounded by all those graduates. And to listen to him was a great gift. And it also made me think in his speech of King Ashoka and the commitment to nonviolent protection and working for the benefit of the world. And in the speech he said, these days, to the graduates, these days he said, we need an application of hope. Hope, he said, is a stance, not a statement. My... family was so embarrassed that I took this piece of paper out of my backpack and began taking notes. During Henry Lovinson, my son said, Mom, it's ridiculous. I said, no, I want to remember what he's saying. The future, he said, is not fate, but a deliberate choice of our heart and, this is to the graduates, a deliberate choice of your good heads and hearts.

[23:29]

Fearlessness has evolutionary value, whereas pervasive dread demotivates us. Practice then, don't theorize. That was great to hear him say, practice, don't theorize. It was Sunday. No, what does he say, will, find the will to go to scale. And I loved this, preach the gospel. at all times, quoting St. Francis of Assisi. Preach the gospel at all times, he said, facing the graduates, and if necessary, use words. Preach the gospel at all times, and if necessary, use words. Because, he said, one good word, one true word, one word that helps to provide for a stance and an application of hopefulness in these times is bread bread.

[24:32]

How did he say it? I want to say it right. Bread for a thousand. And then, last of all, he drew from the Zen tradition. My hand wasn't fast enough to get which Zen teacher he was quoting, but he reminded the thousands that were gathered there in the Greek theater a few weeks ago that real practice is based on infinite gratitude to the past. infinite service in the present, and infinite responsibility for the future. And that that is in each of our hands, minds, hearts, and capacity, capacities. Peace. he closed in saying, quoting Dr. King, peace is not the absence of war, but the presence of justice, remembering again infinite gratitude to the past, dedicating infinite service in the present and infinite responsibility to the future.

[25:46]

So this morning, I want to draw from some... experiences that I've been privileged to have as a practitioner and a person who's working in the world for justice, good food for all, the opportunity to also hold still and sit down, shut up, and settle in to the great matter. So I'm grateful to reminders from the many, many, many practitioners, both in this dharma center and in so many within the zen tradition who make it make a dedication to being peaceful peaceful warriors in a troubled world and i love the contradiction in that peaceful warrior honoring the path of the warrior peaceful warrior wounded healer these are the teachers and the teachings that we need now in order to bring forth these teachings groundedness

[26:54]

in daily practice, is so essentially important. You know, in order to have a day of memory, coming back, decorating the graves of the dead, we need a kind of solid groundedness that will sustain, help us to sustain the gaze and the work. So I'm grateful to friends who have practiced and created a formal Zen peacemaker order. Many practitioners in this room are connected either through the Buddhist Peace Fellowship or directly and explicitly through the work of Zen teacher Bernie Glassman and the Zen Peacemaker Order. But it's not just one particular order, but more of a stance and an application of hope to have this order, a Peacemaker Order. So Bernie Glassman is 72 years old. This is his 72nd year on earth. and he's been a Zen priest since 1970.

[27:55]

When he was close to his 55th birthday, he got himself to the steps of the United States Capitol and decided, it was January 18th, 1994, he sat down on the Capitol steps and said, I'm not moving. This is an ancient vow. finding modern expression. I'm not moving from the steps of this Capitol until I have some understanding what to do about homelessness in our streets, the huge upwelling of AIDS, and violence, tremendous violence. I'm not moving from these steps. And he invited hundreds of his many friends to join him. It was the coldest winter season. up to then in the history of Washington. It was so cold that the Capitol closed down. But he stayed wrapped up in his blanket, on the steps, describes the ice in his mustache. But just the kind of fierce dedication, sitting day by day, five days, and at night finding shelter in the largest homeless shelter.

[29:11]

in the country at that time, the Center for Creative Nonviolence. Now, this craggy, grumpy-looking, bodhidharmic man was an aerospace engineer for the first part of his life and has been a Zen person since he was 25 years old. So... He sat still and at the end of his time he had this inspiration to create a formal order called the Zen Peacemaker Order and to encourage practitioners everywhere to take up the path of peace in whatever way possible. And called up three clear tenets that would mark peacemaking from a Zen point of view. Recognizing and honoring don't know mind.

[30:13]

Or, as I like to say, another way that he said it, which I really like, is find some way, whatever way you can, to unknow the world as you know it, to loosen your hold or your grip, your assurance on what the world is and how you work in it. So first, unknow the world and then bear witness to what is happening in our times. And last of all, make every effort to heal the world or to find wholeness. Now, when I mentioned these tenets to my Dharma sister Arlene yesterday, she reminded me that those kinds of vows, huge vows like that, have to be anchored. in the everyday work of sitting down and getting to know yourself. Unknow yourself a little bit. Bear witness to who you are and find some way to heal and connect with wholeness, which is the root of health in yourself, beginning with this path and long body.

[31:29]

You take up the work. So I wanted to take each of these three points and bring up some examples that have been inspiring to me of modern peacemakers who have directly faced the challenges of war. And immediately when I think of unknowing the world, I think of my Dharma, deep Dharma friend and teacher Mayumi Oda, who was born actually in 1940, and lived in Japan during the bombing of her country. 1941, I should say, she was born. Because this is her 70th year on Earth, this year. And she remembers as a child being taken and hidden in bomb shelters as her country was bombed. and knows that as her life evolved as an artist and an activist and a practitioner, her father was a staunch, dedicated practitioner of meditation every day.

[32:41]

As she took up that practice in her life and combined it with activism and art, her path has led her in many different ways. deep directions, one of the most profound in recognizing the atomic history of her country, of Japan. She has worked toggedly for peace and for the end of nuclear power plants and any kind of nuclear expression in Japan, suing her country years ago, suing her country for their decision to make nuclear power plants. How prescient then for Mayumi to wake up in Japan. She was in Japan on March 11th when the tsunami hit her country. Felt that huge reverberation.

[33:43]

She lives in Hawaii. She was in Japan. Japan was obviously massively affected by the tsunami, as was her home community in Hawaii. Hawaii, as was our community right here, because we share a home in common in Muir Beach. So, as my husband said, all of Miami's world was rocked on that day, all the places where she's been most active and alive. And she was in Japan because she has been entrusted with a piece of property in the old city of Nara, one of the oldest parts of Japan, which is where she was when the tsunami struck in the home temple area of Kovo Daishi in Nara. She's been given a small, deserted village, a little wooden village, as a peace village and a place of practice for young Japanese activists, but not only Japanese activists.

[34:45]

So she made a special pilgrimage to Japan to look at this site And that's where she was when the tsunami struck. So she's about to celebrate her 70th birthday. And she said to me just a day or so ago when I spoke to her, she said, it is time now for me to unknow the world as I've known it. I'm not going to sue my country any longer. I'm not going to wag my finger. I'm not going to also believe that any of this can be healed either by art, activism, or practice alone. But somehow bringing everything together She's been an active member of the Zen Peacemaker Order for a long time. And I love to think of her going back to Japan in a few days to begin actual work on this wooden village in Nara. So I think of her right away when I think of what it really takes to unknow the world.

[35:49]

And I also think of another Japanese woman I met this year at the Veterans Retreat. She calls herself a veteran. She's a philosopher and a writer. Her name is Sakiko. Sakiko Adachi. She came to the Veterans Retreat in the Santa Cruz Mountains because she wanted to acknowledge that she was alive because of the destruction of Hiroshima. She said her family lived in Japan, and her father was a kamikaze pilot who was soon to go on a mission. That mission never happened because of the end of the Second World War, from the bombing of Hiroshima. And she was conceived after he came home And yet, she says she carries that memory or the memory, you know, the realization of why it is she's alive.

[37:02]

Every day of her life, she's aware of that. So she wanted to do something to acknowledge. So it was beautiful to see her receive the Zen precepts and take up of a teaching more formally within this circle of veterans. gathering together, and she was incredibly inspiring to those of us who were there with her, getting to know her. A great reminder from Lao Tzu who says, 30 spokes meet in the hub where the wheel is not is where it's useful. Hollowed out, clay makes a pot. Where the pot is not is where it's useful. Cut doors and windows can make a room. Where the room is not, there is room for you.

[38:08]

So the profit in what is always is in the use of what is not. This is a very strong teaching on Decoration Day. We have the capacity and the metal to settle down into this, finding comfort and ease in unknowing the world and appreciating what is not. And then the next step, of course, is to bear witness to what is. And daily meditation practice, whether in community or solitary practice, a dedicated period in space and time when you settle down, settle yourself on yourself, in order to bear witness is extraordinarily helpful.

[39:11]

Bearing witness. It's such strong language. A witness is one who is called upon to be present at a transition, a transaction, and to take his or her place to attest to what is happening, to testify, to bear knowledge about is to witness, to speak of what you have seen or heard from wit, knowledge, the natural ability to perceive or know, understand, call on your good sense, keenness of perception, ingenuity. Keep your wits about you. The way you keep your wits about you is to remain calm in times of crisis. I was scared out of my wits.

[40:22]

You know, recognition that sometimes what you're facing and what you're bearing is too frightening to even contemplate. And then at your wits end, at the wits end, what lets you keep on bearing witness and looking? From the ancient word, is connected to the word we, or the root of the word, to see, to look after, to guide, connected to wise, wizard. Also, there's an old connection to Hades and the underworld, being wise enough to look into the underworld. So, bearing witness, we can talk more about this. takes a certain kind of incredible courage. And I want to hold up this gift from my friend in Dharma, Sister Barbara Gates, who's one of the primary editors of Inquiring Mind Journal, for the journal.

[41:35]

She's been writing for years, wonderful essay, every single journal, on her experience of practice and activism. So she's recently... interviewed the founders of this project, the Combat Paper Project. Have you heard of this project? Good. I'm glad because then I can tell you about it. So this is a project where art and activism come together very strongly. See if I can find. So the founders of this project, the Combat Paper Project, are two veterans, young veterans. of the Iraq War, the two Drews, Drew Cameron and Drew Matat. And Barbara has been interviewing and working with Drew Cameron. So what these veterans are doing is extremely bold, coming back from the war to this country, wondering how to proceed, how to bear witness

[42:46]

how to bear up and bear down, given what they've seen. And what they've come up with is to actually take their uniforms, their war uniforms, and to cut them into shreds and beat them into pulp and make paper out of them, combat paper, to activate the uniform and to create Something beautiful out of the uniforms. So from Barbara's writing. An image comes to me, Iraq veteran Drew Cameron, standing in full attention, dressed in his desert camouflage uniform. I see him cutting his uniform, slicing it into shreds to boil it down, beating it into a slurry of pulp, passing through a mold and deckle and making it into paper. A year ago, that's how Drew described this to me when I interviewed him.

[43:51]

A creative collaboration, he's calling up, a creative collaboration among veterans, artists, peace activists, and papermakers. I think of Drew at my kitchen table, slim, lithe young man, gesturing with intensity. He was wearing an army cap, what he called his official war hat. one of the last few parts of his uniform, he hadn't turned into paper. He described the process. Deconstructing with scissors and blades, cutting that uniform into pieces, you're getting at the story of the fiber, saturated with oil, dirt, sand, blood, tears, stinking of sweat and tobacco, months of hardship and brutal violence. Somehow you normalize these things. And then he summed up his own experience. I stood there in my underwear and a pair of boots with that cut up stuff all around me on the floor.

[44:54]

It's not bigger than me anymore. It doesn't have to control me. I can look at this in any way I want. I felt completely comfortable. We call this, he says, activating the paper. When it happens, some cry, some shout. We call it liberating the rag, or liberating rag, which is the name of this wonderful article by Barbara. And within this same lineage, I mean, they've started doing this work as a way of bearing witness. to their time in Iraq. I mean, Kristen Lee and their work with combat veterans who are just returning, they're doing wonderful work. There'll be a full sitting at Tassahara with women beginning early June, women vets coming back.

[45:59]

One woman was a guard at Abu Ghraib. There's a waiting list as long as my arm to practice there. There's a huge call now to bear witness and to be heard. and to do it through the trainings of meditation and mindfulness. So in the case of Chris and Lee's work together and the project that Zen Center is supporting, honoring the path of the warrior, retreat at Tassajara, a river rafting trip, and then five days of mindfulness throughout this year where there's an opportunity. In the case of the combat veterans pulling apart their uniforms and working them together, into paper to create a new world. In the question and answer, Barbara's here. We'll have a chance to talk with her more thoroughly about the actual process and project. It's an extraordinary project, and actually it's activated other veterans from older wars to come together and create what's called lineage fiber. So uniforms from older wars are being shredded and made into beauty and art.

[47:04]

So at this junction of activism, art, and deep meditation practice, there is a kind of memorial rising up and a commitment to heal the world. And then last of all, in considering this practice of healing the world, how do you actually do it, become whole, beginning with yourself, with this fathom-long body? And, you know, each of us can ask, how do I take up these practices make them sing and live in me I'll come home to the deep work how do I do that and I think one of the most important ways is to remember how vast the world is I think of one of my young friends

[48:10]

I'm privileged to say he's a friend. He's at least a colleague, a veteran of the Iraq, current war in Iraq, who coming home, actually, he addressed us at the annual meeting of the ecological farming conference and said, you know, I've been, I'm coming home as a soldier, but what I really want to do is to grow food and to heal the world and to feed hungry people. I saw a lot of hunger and sorrow when I was in Iraq, standing with my arms and in my uniform, facing the so-called enemy. I saw a lot of hunger. And he said, I also saw a lot of joy and solidarity coming from growing food. I'd like to dedicate my energy to doing that work. So he came and addressed a consortium of about 1,200 of us, organic farmers from all over the country. And it was incredible. He told about meeting an Iraqi woman in the marketplace, and she offered him a pomegranate, this eternal gesture of a woman offering a pomegranate to a soldier.

[49:18]

And his friend said, don't take it, don't take it. And he took it and said he felt, you know, as he took that piece of fruit, he was really connecting with his desire. to be the kind of person he wanted to be. He came back to this country, got in a lot of trouble, as many vets do, drunk driving, trying to find his way, you know, a lot of trouble, until he finally hooked up with his current partner and sweetheart, Lily, who was a wonderful farmer. Luckily, she straightened him out. And then they had the task of being in their early 20s and looking for land. So they decided they would just drive around, and if they saw land that was beautiful, they would connect with it. And sure enough, in Fairfield, they came across an old walnut orchard, got out of the car, knocked on the door, met two older people who had run the walnut orchard, sat down, told their story, and next thing you knew, they were leasing 10 acres of land.

[50:25]

And they're celebrating a 50th birthday party for the old tractor that now lives again. in Shooting Star Farm. They have 10 acres of extraordinary food, 225 community-supported agriculture. Families are receiving food from Lily and Matt, and Lily is an incredible farmer, and she is the daughter, surprisingly and magically and mysteriously, of one of my closest dharma Buddies, who's also a practitioner in the lineage of Thich Nhat Hanh and a peacemaker. He never proselytized meditation to his daughter, and she never sat still for a minute. And yet, and yet, and yet, this is the way we heal the world in mysterious ways. And it spreads out so that you have a Zen priest on the shores of the Susquehanna River in central Pennsylvania. doing a memorial service for the Susquehanna River, which is now poisoned by hydrofracking.

[51:31]

Extraordinary, extraordinary amount of damage going into that river, the same river that runs and cools the waters of Three Mile Island, the river that burned in the 1970s from radioactive pollution and poison on the waters. Realizing that healing the world is the work of all of us. So they've just, on the same day, that Amory Lovins stood in the Greek theater and admonished my daughter and the other able graduates surrounding her to apply a hopeful stance to the living world. The Zen community on the shores of the Susquehanna River did a ceremony of putting flowers on the water, each person offering two flowers to the water, one in gratitude, one in commitment, to protect our world, to heal our world. And they didn't only do it on the Susquehanna River, but a call to anyone to gather a flower, two flowers, and put them in the water and make the commitment to, in this way, heal the world.

[52:44]

So it's a lot of stories and a course Of course, the real liberation depends on each one of us figuring out how to do the work personally and deeply and how to remember what we're called upon to be. So I'd like to invite us now just to close this time together, this Dharma talk and this morning of practice. with one minute of mindful sitting, just sitting quietly and letting the world come home to us in all of its glory, unknowing anything solid and firm, any notion we may have, for one precious minute of awareness, my heart and mind together in the present moment, for one precious minute to unknow the world,

[53:56]

To bear witness to whatever in your own body-mind needs to be born up or born down to. And to feel in yourself what it means to find health and healing. To let Decoration Day begin today in this hall of no mistakes. If you want, you can put your hand, as sometimes the prison class that Martha works with at San Quentin does, putting the hand on the heart, one hand on the belly, one hand on the heart. If you want to, you can do this. And just remind yourself silently, you know, I'm here. I'm here to be quiet for a minute. Thank you very much.

[55:43]

We dedicate the merit of our time together to a deep gratitude to the past, dedicated service to the present, and a sense of responsibility and connection to the future. Thank you very much. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our programs are made possible by the donations we receive. Please help us to continue to realize and actualize the practice of giving by offering your financial support. For more information, visit sfcc.org and click Giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[56:28]

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