Doug Anderson: Another Birthday and the Heart Sutra

Now well past the age T’Ang poets sent old men
to the mountains to wander and live close to the bone.
How a sudden gust could sound a chord through the trees.
The way pine scent from higher up could ease the heart.
What remains, love: no one left to fight inside or out.
Gone the young fool swaggering in delusion. Tired.
Can’t keep my eyes open, my lids bring the curtain
down while another, inside, lifts. My God,
that first girl, so long ago. The way she slid her arms
around my neck on the dance floor and moved into me.
Form is emptiness, emptiness is form: but oh, what form.

—

Copyright 2017 Doug Anderson