“When composing a verse let there not be a hair’s breath separating your mind from what you write; composition of a poem must be done in an instant, like a woodcutter felling a huge tree or a swordsman leaping at a dangerous enemy.”

Between our two lives there is also the life of the cherry blossom.

When your consciousness has become ripe in true zazen-pure like clear water, like a serene mountain lake, not moved by any wind-then anything may serve as a medium for realization.

Come out to view / the truth of flowers blooming / in poverty.

Fresh spring! / The world is only Nine days old – / These fields and mountains!

Collecting all The rains of May The swift Mogami River.

Spring rain conveyed under the trees in drops.

The basis of art is change in the universe.

Make the universe your companion, always bearing in mind the true nature of things-mountains and rivers, trees and grasses, and humanity-and enjoy the falling blossoms and the scattering leaves.

Every day is a journey, and the journey itself is home.

The sea darkens And a wild duck s call Is faintly white.

Friends part forever wild geese lost in cloud.

Sitting quietly, doing nothing, Spring comes, and the grass grows, by itself.

Felling a tree and gazing at the cut end – tonight’s moon.

Poverty’s child – he starts to grind the rice, and gazes at the moon.

Winter solitude- in a world of one colour the sound of the wind.

Come, see the true flowers of this pained world.

For every breath that catches the attention of my lungs – I am grateful.

More breath than mind. More moon silk than sunbeam. More bone than break.

When faced with a crisis, do three things: breathe, pray and be kind.

The best books are those which lift us to a higher plane where we breathe a purer atmosphere.

You are a living breathing museum.

Finding inner peace is a lost art for with every breath and sigh new stimuli comes and leaves us in a pool of racing thoughts and worries.

Should you find the most convenient way of breathing, it will not make you feel more alive.

I am mystic bones and a curious heart. Pain and joy and stardust skin. A sacred soul container. Time and space and matter and illusion. Expansion and contraction. A breathing universe.