Norman Fischer is a poet, essayist, and Zen Buddhist priest. Recent poetry titles include Men in Suits (BlazeVox), There Was a Clattering As... (Lavender Ink), and Nature (Tuumba). His Selected Poems 1980-2013 is available from Chax Press. His latest prose title is When You Greet Me I Bow: Reflections from a Life in Zen. Through a Window is forthcoming from Roof Books. A former abbot of the San Francisco Zen Center, he is the founder of Everyday Zen . His more than thirty books can be found at www.NormanFischer.org He lives in Muir Beach California.
Excerpt from"Through a Window", forthcoming Fall 2024 by Roof Books
look into that piec e
of sky fragile opaqu e
heartbreak pale blu e
with bird or tw o
flits by in it — see tha t
wonder whether saw o r
not dark backlit smal l
birdlet though can hea r
many such sam e
in above tree s
stained red (that i s
stained red wood stained suc h
for preservatio n)
little porch don’t se e
throug h
window but throug h
door opened throug h
which can se e
what’s otherwise not see n
behind white close d
door but ye s
now porc h
shadow fencerail car s
criss-crossin g
tree s
(2/10/21)
___
Blaze of light ball of
Above can’t look at
Honey cream over all yellow
Is yellows it some dis
tance
Sound of scraping or loading
Unloading truck is it truck
This light makes all
in
Foreground dark because
Backlit light light renders
Objects fading as if shrink
ing
In fright of light greed envy
Idleness gluttony lustfulness
And more riding in on strange
Beasts the more light the
More shad
ow
(12/17/21)
___
The crouching lion there
Jammed up against dark
Shapes of visual a tree
Grows out its head
Some bird flies this and that
Way in very light blue sky
Holds it all in its beyond
As words suggest beyond for this
Story of temptation of knowledgeAs eros desperate unless
Some simple story of those
One knows or knew forgotten
In immediacy of such writing
Such seeing such feeling of warm
On chest on sunny daylight
Focussed by window on one
Squinting eye
(12/17/21)
___
Narrow horizontal band
of
Window with bar
in
center
Metal bar
in
center self
in
center as bar
making picture blind
Half drawn as eye half open
Horizontal lines of fence slats
Of retaining wall grid of wire
Mesh fencing tacked between
Four by fours red with wood stain
Before green plants some
Mess of plants behind and
Slats of formal gate thick
Posts to hold
it (the wall)
up
holding in turn
In turn dirt
Behind to make flat area
Where’d otherwise be slope
(12/17/21)
___
O falling hillside curves
steep in full light
behind —
wavering cypress
branches
twitch with vigor in
Brisk. Ocean. Air Some
gray , pale gray
succulents at wind
ow’s
edge to far left
and yes the little green
grass blades also
twitch flexible
Nature: windowbedient
(2/2021)
___
Now weathered face
where heavy cypress trunk’s
been
lopped off but main
cypress trunk shaggy-barked
muscles up to skycap
hidden by win
dow’s
top edge
smaller branches wave
to right
flutter stretch out
above grasses and
strapleaved iris
without flowers this time
of year — sun patch
Beyond
(2/20/21)
___
Light’s gathered to paint
Where
Plum tree’s fresh
in
Bloom [white
petals on gray
Wood mottled with greeny lichen
Old plum cut back strong
thought dead
and
seemed
so
two years
then burst forth bloom
last year
and copious
plums
then
and back again now
with sunlit bloom
Their
Day
> back. Again. Now<
