Wandering roads with my posse in tow,
Certain I knew all there was to know.
My plans, my opinions, my kingdoms of sand,
A fist full of certainty clenched in my hand.
The world seemed broken, crooked and strange,
Everybody else needing somehow to change.
Pointing at leaders, pollution and war,
Yet somehow kept missing what Dharma was for.
Then one autumn evening beneath silver moon,
A wise old wanderer hummed a strange tune.
“Free the possums,” he chuckled, “don’t strengthen your posse.
One leads to wisdom, the other’s quite bossy.”
Laughing at the riddle and shook my old head,
Perhaps he’d been sleeping too long in his bed.
But he pointed within and asked me to see,
“Which voice is forever shouting ‘me, me’?
Which one wants praise and which one wants more?
Which one keeps score upon score upon score?
Which one gets angry when life doesn’t fit?
Which one throws tantrums and blames every bit?
That’s your posse of habits, attachment and pride.
The thief that you’ve carried and housed deep inside.”
Sitting with his words as we watched the night sky,
And noticed a question beginning to pry.
Could all of my troubles, both little and vast,
Depend on a story I’d clung to so fast?
The self I’d protected both day and night,
Might not be as solid as I thought it might.
The wanderer smiled as stillness drew near,
“The animal realm starts exactly here.
Not farms full of creatures or forests of trees,
But minds on automatic doing as they please.
Following impulse, confusion and fog,
Like chasing a squirrel or walking a dog.
Ignoring causes, conditions and flow,
Too distracted to question, too hurried to know.”
The breeze gently rustled the leaves overhead,
As old cherished certainties loosened and fled.
Thinking of the oceans choked thick with waste,
Of forests cut down through our hunger and haste.
Thinking of the quarrels, the nations at war,
And saw they arose from the very same core.
A mine against yours. A them against us.
A mountain created from one little fuss.
The posse grows larger each time that we cling,
To status or suffering, loss or a king.
Yet the possums he spoke of were trapped all the same,
Bound by confusion and caught in the game.
Sentient wanderers circling round,
Mistaking illusion for permanent ground.
“Free the possums,” he said once again.
“Have compassion for all who are caught in this chain.
For every sentient being seeks happiness true,
Though many don’t know what they’re trying to do.
Plant wisdom like seeds in the depth of the stream,
Awakening slowly from self-making dream.”
The moon drifted higher and silence grew deep,
The kind that awakens instead of makes sleep.
No self could be found when examined with care,
Yet appearances danced and functioned right there.
Like rainbows arising when sunlight meets rain,
Dependently formed, yet ungraspable, plain.
The Two Truths embraced like old friends at last,
The future, the present, the dream of the past.
Not nothing existed. Not things standing alone.
The middle way shining where wisdom had grown.
So now when I wander through bustle and din,
Remembering the field that is tended within.
Not greener elsewhere. Not greener through gain.
But greener through caring again and again.
And when my old posse comes calling for me,
Demanding attention and shouting to be free,
Smiling at the racket and loosen its leash,
Returning to stillness and spacious release.
For the path isn’t found in the loud worldly scrum,
But in freeing the possums, one by one.
Not the possums outside beneath moonlight above,
But the beings trapped inside self-grasping’s glove.
May all find the wisdom obscurations conceal.
May awareness awaken. May compassion feel.
And may we stop feeding the posse of “mine”,
So the possums of samsara are freed, unbind.
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