<html><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body style="overflow-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;"><div dir="auto" style="overflow-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">As The Waters Broke</span><br><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><i>for Shunryu Suzuki Roshi</i></span><br><br><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">We first lived in, were first carried in </span><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Water! </span><br><br><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Waters breaking, announcing our birth—our separation from—</span><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">our original, undivided, deathless, unborn, holy, present awareness.</span><br><br><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">My teacher's teacher visited Yosemite and said</span><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">that a human life resembles</span><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">a drop of water in Yosemite Creek—</span><br><br><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Flung into space, rushed into being</span><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">separating, individuating, alone, </span><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">as it falls toward the valley floor far below.</span><br><br><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Then, too soon, the drop ends. Its drippy individuality </span><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">surrendered as it merges with its kin drops to rejoin </span><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Yosemite Creek, Merced, San Joaquin, Pacific.</span><br><br><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Just like that</span><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Dying, we drop our human individuality, and return to </span><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">our original, undivided, deathless, unborn, holy, present awareness—</span><br><br><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">The one we left as the waters broke.</span><br><br><br><br><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>- Dan Gurney</span></div></body></html>