Living In Peace, Not Resting In Peace
Peace never dies - it rests eternal, waiting to be seen. Thich Nhat Hanh saw it.
I went for a walk this early morning, thinking of a special person, a teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh, who has passed away.
He was after all is said and done - a man of peace, for peace, with peace, in peace. And when I think of him, I can only think of peace and how much we all suffer by not seeing it.
In essence, peace is what master Kong Qiu said long ago, “learning to call things by their right names”. It is seeing the essential in the world. An unmasking of Maya, the illusion we all dress in daily. It is how we participate in the world, engaged, with peace as Thich Nhat Hanh so well taught.
In my life, I’ve fought to get more awareness paid to the subject of peace in our classrooms. To little effect. See my Project Peace. I think of a mentor and colleague - Andrew Park Finch, who also promoted how important peace is, in teaching - to the future that teachers and schools impart. I think of so many “men of peace” - the Berrigans, Emma Goldman, Mandela, Uri Avnery, Daisaku Ike, Gandhi, Caldicott, Martin Buber, Sam Hamill and many more … I think of them and how they’d call things by their right names.
I think of Thich Nhat Hanh and his poem, Call Me By My True Names and how he remains a light of peace urging us all to live in truth by calling things by their true names.
Tat Tvam Asi - Thou Art That.
Calling Me By My True Names
Don’t say that I will depart tomorrow—
even today I am still arriving.
Look deeply: every second I am arriving
to be a bud on a Spring branch,
to be a tiny bird, with still-fragile wings,
learning to sing in my new nest,
to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower,
to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.
I still arrive, in order to laugh and to cry,
to fear and to hope.
The rhythm of my heart is the birth and death
of all that is alive.
I am a mayfly metamorphosing
on the surface of the river.
And I am the bird
that swoops down to swallow the mayfly.
I am a frog swimming happily
in the clear water of a pond.
And I am the grass-snake
that silently feeds itself on the frog.
I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones,
my legs as thin as bamboo sticks.
And I am the arms merchant,
selling deadly weapons to Uganda.
I am the twelve-year-old girl,
refugee on a small boat,
who throws herself into the ocean
after being raped by a sea pirate.
And I am also the pirate,
my heart not yet capable
of seeing and loving.
I am a member of the politburo,
with plenty of power in my hands.
And I am the man who has to pay
his “debt of blood” to my people
dying slowly in a forced-labor camp.
My joy is like Spring, so warm
it makes flowers bloom all over the Earth.
My pain is like a river of tears,
so vast it fills the four oceans.
Please call me by my true names,
so I can hear all my cries and laughter at once,
so I can see that my joy and pain are one.
Please call me by my true names,
so I can wake up
and the door of my heart
could be left open,
the door of compassion.