Dear Supreme Ching Hai,
I am a young girl from mainland China. I am most fortunate to have read Your sample booklet and news magazines, and I am very excited. I often ask myself, “Who actually am I?” Sometimes when I go walking, I feel a surge of unexpected sorrow and sadness, but I did not know why. I do not like to talk a lot. Now and again I write down, in a diary, my thoughts or a few sentences that are not really poems. Among them there are two that best express my heart-felt feelings.
(I)
Gentle rain falls down so beautifully,
Aching pounds my heart.
When can I return?
My soul, so despondent. I am who?
My soul, so lost. Who am I?
Crystal tear-drops,
How to dissolve my homesick sorrow?
Brilliant moon,
Can yet see through the Milky Way in my heart.
|
(II)
The clear sound of the Zen staff appears in my dreams,
My mood flutters with it.
My heart follows You and walks out of my dream.
This is my Home, which I for so long have missed.
This is the music, which I have not heard for a hundred years,
The repeating sounds of the Mu-yu*
Is the treasure in the depth of my soul.
|
My reverend Master, how I wish that I can go to Formosa, to be able to be by Your side and listen to Your discourses. But I still go to school and cannot make the money for the fares. Neither do I know the way. How I wish that our hearts were joined, so that I could invite You into mine. Oh! How much I wish!
Awaiting Your reply.
May You, Master, save all the wanderers!
* Mu-yu is a hollow, round, wooden block that Buddhists knock while chanting.