OUTSIDE THE GATE LOOKING BACKWARDS

         While in this present, we curse the darkness and do not see the light.

    We spend our lives looking at the few past glorious memories we have with joy.

                        We forget that the suffering of others has surrounded us.

             Or we spend our time looking at the past and the regrets that we have.

                    We forget that we have rejected a thousand opportunities.

          Likewise we spend much time dwelling in the immediate or far-away future.

                  We hope or pray that it will be better than the obscure present.

                   We continue making ourselves the centre of the universe.

          The true moments of the present, their plenitude ignored, pass by us.

                           We gaze in the clouded mirrors of past and future.

                       We fail to see that we are the Universe, here and now.

                                                                                                   Shanjian