Night Boat

by Alan Spence

  Beloved Fuji –

  The mist clears and reveals

  Your snowy whiteness.

  I remembered the day I had seen the Daimyo’s procession, when I’d glimpsed the face of that beautiful woman passing by, like a vision. I thought of Hana. I dipped the tip of the brush in the ink, wrote haiku of my own.

  Miss Fuji,

  Cast aside your hazy robe

  And show me your snowy skin.

  I looked at what I’d written, what I’d drawn, and it was complete. I felt a quiet excitement and with it a kind of gratitude, and I bowed to the work I’d made.

  That night Bao sat staring at the scroll for some time. Eventually he spoke.

  Wise Crane, he said. I don’t know how much I can teach you. Learn to write by writing. Learn to draw by drawing.

  He bowed and handed the scroll back to me, then he poured me a little sake, lit a tobacco pipe and passed it to me, and it felt like a kind of recognition, an initiation. But in spite of Bao’s implied praise, the sense of satisfaction was immediately replaced by a kind of emptiness.

  The next morning I sat with Onbazan and he told me about something he’d just been reading, the story of a Zen master, Kaisen Shoki.

  Along with a hundred other monks, Kaisen was taken prisoner by a samurai warrior, Oda Nobunaga, who accused them of consorting with his enemies. The monks were herded into a courtyard and dry branches were piled up all around them and set alight, a pyre to burn them alive.

  As the flames rose, one monk asked Kaisen, Since we cannot escape the passing of all things in this world, where shall we find the everlasting?

  Kaisen replied, It is here, right before your eyes, in this very place.

  The monk asked, What place is this, before my eyes?

  As the flames licked around him and caught the hem of his garment, Kaisen said, If you have conquered your ego, coolness will rise even from the fire.

  Then the flames consumed him.

  Coolness will rise even from the fire.

  When I heard these words I couldn’t breathe. To attain that poise, even in the face of the all-consuming fire. The very thought of it left me shaken and humbled. Becoming a poet was all very well, but even if I surpassed the greatest poets, Li Po and Tu Fu, it would not save me from the fire or grant me that poise in the face of it. I felt the old despondency begin to descend. I wandered outside, and there, stacked on the verandah, were hundreds of dusty old books – scriptures and manuals of instruction – left out to be aired. When I saw them I felt an immediate calmness, a surge of inexplicable joy, dispelling the black mood. I lit a stick of incense, made three deep bows and chanted.

  Buddhas in the ten directions, gods who guard the Dharma, I place my trust in you. Guide me and show me the way I should follow.

  I closed my eyes and reached into the pile of books, settled on one and lifted it up, breathed in its musty smell. I pressed it to my forehead, felt an intense reverence. I opened my eyes and they filled with tears when I saw what I had chosen, or what had been chosen for me. It was a great classic of Zen teaching – Spurring Students through the Zen Barrier. I opened it at random and read.

  As you travel in your search for wisdom, yield not to fatigue. Be oblivious of day and night. Have no fear of heat or cold. Do not let your thoughts scatter aimlessly. Do not look left or right, forward or backward, up or down. Walk on.

  Again I pressed the book to my forehead, overcome with gratitude.

  I was grateful to Bao for his teaching, but it was time to move on. I was ready to settle again in a community of monks, resume the rigours of intense practice. Poverty and chastity would be my friends, and nothing would deflect me from my purpose. Bao said I could keep the book I had plucked from the pile, and I kept it close by me constantly, read and re-read it as I prepared to resume my life of pilgrimage.

  One morning, when Bao had headed off once more to Ogaki, and Onbazan had gone into the village for supplies, I looked up from the book and was surprised to see a slight figure, a young monk, heading up the steep path to the temple. I was even more surprised when he approached and addressed me by name.

  You are Nagasawa Iwajiro, he asked, known as Ekaku?

  I am.

  The young man bowed and handed me a letter.

  This is from your father, he said.

  He stood, deferential, and I knew before I read one word that the letter contained bad news. I unfolded the paper, read the columns of careful script, announcing, in formal language, that my mother had died suddenly after a short illness. My father had stamped it with his seal, in red, and signed it. Your father, Nagasawa Genzaemon.

  I could picture him seated at his desk, writing it, back straight, the brush gripped firmly in his hand. I read the words again, and again, till they ceased to have any meaning. The characters separated, came adrift, dissolved into their constituent images and floated on the page, disconnected.

  I read Mother. Illness. Death.

  A kneeling woman, with two dots for breasts. I drew it as a child, learning to write.

  A sickbed and a thin frail figure lying in it.

  Death a skull and a heap of bones.

  I looked up and was surprised to see the young man still standing there.

  Forgive me, I said. This is a poor hovel, but I have a few coins left.

  No, he said, bowing. No. Your father paid me to bring the message and to take back a reply on my return.

  I was touched, and bowed to him deeply. He waited while I fetched a small scroll of paper and my brush and ink.

  What to say that would have any meaning?

  At the top of the page, thinking of Hara, I drew Fuji, just three brushstrokes. Then I wrote one word. Sorrow. Underneath I drew a crane in flight and signed it. Your son, Ekaku.

  I handed the scroll to the messenger, thanked him, watched him go. Somewhere a hototogisu called, its cry piercing and sharp. Before I knew it I was shaken with sobs, and tears were pouring down my face.

  What did this mean, that my mother was no more? That form no longer existed. I would never see her again, that good woman who had borne me, loved me, protected me. She was gone, dissolved into nothing.

  I sat up all night in zazen, mind clear and cold.

  At first I struggled to see her face, to bring it into focus. Then it was there, so vivid and alive she might have been in the room. She smiled the way she did when she held me and hushed me and kept the fires of hell at bay, when she wiped the tears away after we’d cried at the story of Nisshin Shonin, when she waved goodbye to me that last time as I set out on the path to enlightenment.

  The last time.

  I chanted the Daimoku in her honour.

  Namu Myoho Renge Kyo.

  She had absolute faith in the sutra. But could it be that even she, for all her goodness and kindness, her simple faith and devotion, had to descend into hell?

  Her face changed, showed pain and suffering, and I wanted to tell her as she had once told me that it was fine, it was just a dream and everything would be all right.

  By the end of the night the way was clear. I had already decided to return to the Zen path, now my commitment to it would be absolute. If my mother should be suffering in the deepest hell, I would go there and find her.

  I chanted from the Four Great Vows.

  Sentient beings are numberless. I vow to save them all.

  My mother’s face was calm again, eyes closed, then she faded and was gone. The rats scuttled behind the torn shoji screens. I lit another stick of incense, sat like a stone as the dark night lightened to cold grey.

  In the early morning I packed my belongings, such as they were, the few clothes I wasn’t wearing, a blanket and begging bowl, a spare pair of straw sandals, wooden geta for walking in the mud and rain. I also packed my brushes and inkstone, half a dozen of my drawings, rolled up tight, and the most precious thing I now owned, the copy of the Zen Barrier book Bao had said I could keep.

  In return I gave Bao the drawing I had done of Fuji, with
the haiku about her snowy skin. For Onbazan I had written out the haiku about the incense burning down, above it a swirl like smoke.

  They had come out to see me off. Onbazan was sad to see me go, and even Bao, in his gruff way, seemed sorry I was leaving.

  The place won’t stink quite so much of Zen once you’ve gone, he said. But I’m sure you’ll be back to teach us a thing or two after you’ve shaken up all those gods and Buddhas.

  I bowed three times, pressed my forehead to the hard earth. Then I stood up and slung my pack over my shoulders. The weight of it felt good. I gave one last bow and was on my way again, back on the Zen road.

  THREE

  WIND AND RAIN

  M

  onths passed, years. I travelled where the wind blew me, walked from province to province, from temple to temple. If I fell in with a group of monks on a pilgrimage, I would join them. If I heard of a Dharma talk being given by some eminent priest in a remote corner of the country, I would make my way there, no matter how far. I passed through towns and villages, mingled with the crowds along the Tokaido, walked on alone over hills and through valleys, across desolate moorland. I scrambled up steep slopes, along narrow paths. I waded through marshland, crossed shallow streams.

  At times I barely noticed the countryside I walked through, so fierce was my concentration on the teachings in the book I carried with me. I challenged myself with one koan after another, spurred myself through the Zen barrier.

  At one temple, Hofuku-ji in Horado, the head monk Nanzen seemed to see something in me. Like Bao, he wrote poetry, but his disposition was altogether milder, more scholarly. He asked to read my verses and see my calligraphy, and he nodded his approval. He wrote a poem for the New Year.

  Old Man South shakes the sword of wisdom.

  Without this chilling winter, no spring.

  The New Year welcomes peace, prosperity, long life.

  I wrote a response, in the same style.

  He shakes the sword, a handful of frost.

  His chamber is flooded with light.

  He burns incense to welcome the New Year.

  He laughed, his old eyes crinkled, and he thanked me for the poem. After a few weeks he said my progress was remarkable, and after some months he made me the third-ranking monk among the sixty or so who lived at the temple. I was grateful for his gentle encouragement, but the following summer I felt the need to challenge myself again. With the old monk’s blessing, I shouldered my pack, got back out walking in the wind and the rain.

  I was looking for a place where a monk might find time for solitary retreat, and yet feed himself with the offerings placed in his begging bowl. Nanzen had recommended I try Shoju-ji, near Matsuyama Castle in Iyo province.

  The climate is good, he had said, and the land around the castle is fertile.

  So the people are prosperous, I’d said.

  Indeed.

  Perfect for an eager young monk with an empty purse.

  The journey was long, and I had to cross the Inland Sea to Shikoku by ferry. The castle was visible from some distance away, the surrounding farmland flat and green. I had stopped at a few more temples on the way, listening to more words, words, words. By the time I reached Shoju-ji, my reputation had preceded me. Somehow Nanzen had passed on a message to the head monk, telling him of my intensity and of my prowess in poetry and calligraphy.

  So he summoned me to his quarters, looked at me long and hard. He didn’t have the ferocity of Bao or the gentleness of Nanzen. I guessed he had settled comfortably into his role as head of the temple and had long since given up testing himself too rigorously.

  We are fortunate here, he said at last, in having the protection and patronage of the castle. The Daimyo, the lord of Matsuyama, is eager to gain merit by supporting us.

  I see, I said, eyes down, noncommittal.

  He looked at me even more intently, not sure, perhaps, if I was being ironic. Then he explained that the Daimyo’s chief minister was a man of great learning and culture, with a particular interest in painting and calligraphy.

  He has invited a small party from the temple to visit him at his residence, and it would be advantageous if you were part of that group.

  I let his words settle, fell to thinking about Hana and the visits to her father’s home, the luxury of it. The scent of jasmine.

  Well?

  I breathed in, bowed.

  It would be an honour.

  Our host was a high-ranking military officer, a formidable warrior with the high shaved forehead, the swept-back hair, of the samurai. We were served tea and small sugared cakes that sparkled on the palate. They were so delicious I had to stop myself from shovelling them into my mouth and crunching every last one. There was much small talk about the weather and the seasons and the lushness of the rice harvest. Then our host gave a small sign, a raise of the hand, and everything was cleared away, and an old servant brought out a collection of hanging scrolls, one after another, each one more beautiful than the last.

  The head monk nodded his appreciation, expressed his gratitude to the minister, who said he had a question about one of the scrolls.

  I am unable to understand the Chinese characters, said the minister. Perhaps someone can help me decipher the text?

  The head monk cleared his throat, picked up the scroll, held it at arm’s length, turned it this way and that then admitted he was baffled.

  With respect, he said, the characters are badly formed and it’s impossible to make sense of them.

  The other monks in our party also peered at the scroll, admitted defeat. Then one of them nodded in my direction.

  Perhaps our young friend here can bring his wisdom to bear.

  The head monk grinned.

  Yes, he said. Wise Crane. Perhaps you would deign to come down from your perch above the clouds and enlighten us.

  I took the scroll, looked closely at the inscription. It was indeed illegible.

  A scroll and a scrawl, I said.

  The general smiled.

  I asked if I might have brush and ink, a piece of paper. Again the general had only to raise his hand and they appeared before me. I folded back my sleeve, took the brush and very carefully wrote the Chinese characters for Old mother-in-law, held it up for everyone to read.

  It’s a title for the scroll, I said.

  We can read the characters, said the head monk. But what are they supposed to mean?

  Words can have more than one meaning, I said. These characters can also mean Difficult to read.

  The minister threw back his head and laughed.

  My mother-in-law is definitely difficult to read!

  It’s the way you tell them, Ekaku, said one of the other monks.

  The minister laughed again, louder.

  Take my mother-in-law, he said. Please!

  He called for sake to be poured, then he said he had something really special to show us, and he brought out an elaborate wooden box wrapped in the finest silk brocade. Carefully, almost reverently, he unwrapped the box, opened the lid and lifted out another scroll, held it up for our admiration.

  The other pieces had been impressive, but this was truly breathtaking. The artwork and calligraphy were by the great master Daigu Sochiku. The composition was exquisite, the verse striking.

  Is it wind that moves, or mind?

  But more than form or content, it was the energy, the sheer vigour of the brushstrokes that raised the work to another level. Something palpable and powerful flowed from it, struck the viewer like a blow to the heart.

  For the rest of the evening I was speechless. Back at the temple I went immediately to the dormitory and gathered up the few paintings of my own I had carried with me on my travels, rolled up in my backpack. I also took the notebooks in which I had copied out poems and some pieces of calligraphy I had collected and kept. I bundled up the lot and carried it out to the old graveyard. I piled it up on the ground, in front of one of the ancient, weathered tombstones, and I set fire to it all, stood and
watched as it burned away to nothing.

  FIRE AND BRIMSTONE

  I

  had been away from Hara, and from Shoin-ji, for a long time. On my return I visited my father and found him distracted, distant. He had settled for growing old and he found it difficult to talk about my mother. His features would clench, his mouth a grimace, as he spoke her name. Then he would gather himself, comment on the fact that I was looking thin and weather-beaten.

  He mentioned my brother two or three times, said he was prosperous and had made a success of his life. Yozaemon had married and had two children, a boy and a girl. He lived in Numazu where he had his own business, brewing shoyu, and every week he came here to Hara to help with the running of the way-station.

  I wish him well, I said. My own road is different.

  My father told me if I went to Shoin-ji I would find the old place much reduced.

  Times are hard, I said.

  Yes, he said. Well.

  We had little to say to each other, and our meeting left me unsettled. But I stepped outside and great Fuji still stood there, a constant, an eternal presence, overlooking the town. As I gazed up at it, my heart filled to bursting.

  Much reduced. How my father had described it, and exactly how it seemed to me now. It felt physically smaller, somehow shrunk in on itself, and one or two of the old buildings looked ready to collapse. I reported to the head priest, who had also aged and shrunk, and he gave me a slight bow, a mere nod of the head.

  Wise Crane, we had heard rumours of your return.

  Hara is a small place, I said, bowing low.

  Too small for you, he asked, or not small enough?

  Small enough and big enough, I said.

  And how long will you stay with us?