(As you might know, my wife is dying of cancer, that’s why you’ll see a bunch of death related posts on my blog for a bit.)
I first heard this poem sung as a song by Sister Chang Kong at a retreat with Thich Nhat Hanh. She talked about how she had sung it at the bed of a dying friend, and how it comforted him. It comforts me too.
This body is not me; I am not caught in this body
I am life without boundaries,
I have never been born and I have never died.
Over there the wide ocean and the sky with many galaxies
All manifests from the basis of consciousness
Since beginningless time I have always been free.
Birth and death are only a door through which we go in and out.
Birth and death are only a game of hide-and-seek.
So smile to me and take my hand and wave good-bye.
Tomorrow we shall meet again or even before.
We shall always be meeting again at the true source,
Always meeting again on the myriad paths of life.-Thich Nhat Hanh
Technorati Tags: Mindfulness, Death
[...] One effect of having the vigil for three days was that by the end, her body had started to change. It was dehydrating, and while not gross, you could very clearly see it was just a shell. A chrysalis. Everyone who visited got to witness, first hand, that the body isn’t the person, but just a place for the person to reside for a time. [...]
HI, I came across your blog looking for the full version of Thich Nhat Hahns Meditation. I just wanted to send you a hug as what you obviously went through is very painful x