Hit with a salt shaker

 

When I asked the Venerable Sashi,

on the island of Hondo,

during the Plum Blossom Festival,

'Who is the Buddha?'

he asked me for a plum branch

and then whipped me with it.

And so I was enlightened.

But later in life I married

and wandered from the Pure Land

as I became distracted with 

my household.

One morning I asked my wife

'Is there any marmalade left?'

The blessed woman hit me 

with the salt shaker, and my

vision was restored.

Then I worked with the lilies

of the field and fowls on the ground

to provide beauty and sustenance

to the world,

which led me to a listical existence,

a grasping of names,

craving more details,

that was frustrating and very limiting.

At last I fled back to the island of Hondo,

to the Venerable Sashi.

He held up his hand to me,

with the fingers spread apart,

and said

"Point to what is between my fingers."

I threw a custard pie at his outstretched hand.

And we both knew a new enlightenment

as we dined on the smashed pastry

with our chopsticks.