Before There Is Moonlight

Don’t be surprised to meet yet not recognize

What is surely a familiar face from the past.

~ The Record of Tung-shan, 114

The imagery and dream-like quality of Tung Shan’s Five Ranks, five short verses of poetry written by the 9th century Chinese monk, is evocative of the awakening mind. Among the most brocade-beautiful of all classic Zen poetry, they are lyrical rather than analytic, felt rather than explained. For many decades, The Five Ranks have been a capstone to Pacific Zen’s curriculum of formal koan study. A couple of weeks ago, in this note, we came upon the second of the five verses, (“An old lady, having just awakened…”). Above is the first of the five. For me, it represents stepping through a dark and unknowable gate, but one which is somehow familiar.

A short while ago, I got off the phone with my daughter, who just graduated from a small private college, though the ceremony was cancelled, and she is now looking for her first real job after college. Just before midnight…

As her father, of course, every glass I see is half full. I told her about my first summer after college, when I returned to Alaska to find work as a salmon fisherman. A family friend, who had worked a half century as a merchant marine, said: “Just tell them you are a great cook!” And so, up in Petersburg, I called around from the pay phone at the docks, telling captains I was a good cook. Captain Jerry, from the Indian village of Kake, hired me on the strength of those culinary skills and the assumption that with a last name like Joseph, he later told me, I was surely Tsimsihan, like himself. A couple of months later, following poor fishing and some bad behavior on my part, Captain Jerry left me and my bags on the dock. I then went to clean fresh-caught silver salmon in a cold storage and cannery, and then worked as a carpenter for a couple of months, helping renovate the village doctor’s home…before there is moonlight…

There have been 38.6 million unemployment claims filed in the last nine weeks, with more people out of work than at any time since the Great Depression. Last summer, my daughter worked in Washington DC, but jobs there are now scarce. And a fellowship in Sacramento failed to materialize. Gig jobs like writer, graphic designer, and web designer, are on hold. And waitressing? Stand in line. Don’t be surprised to meet, yet not recognize…

As she enters through this gate of unknowing, just at midnight, and before the moon rises, I feel as if I have faced this gate before, and now I am going through it again. Perhaps we all are. Perhaps we are all going through together. It is scary, and exciting, and impossible. But somehow we can, and will, pass through…

Print: Sea Turtle. Thank you Mayumi Oda, the Original Goddess!