Vol. 4. June 10, 2020
Tennessee Williams once wrote: “Life is an unanswered question. But let’s still believe in the dignity and importance of the question.”
The most lethal conflict in American history was the Civil War. 620,000 citizens died in four years.
In the current pandemic, more than 100,000 citizens have died in about 100 days.
To get a sense of the enormity of this tragedy, I spent a while in contemplation in Calvary Cemetery.
In Calvary, the diamonds of 80,000 dead egos lie underground, their lives celebrated in carved stones above. City fathers, former teachers, past parents, holy men and women. Chalices of emptiness.
The Victorian landscape weeps with ornate statues, sad crypts and mournful monuments.
Everything is bleak and silent. Seemingly in motion, seemingly still. Seemingly dead, seemingly alive.
Crickets crawl on the granite carved tags. Nameless names. Faceless faces. Lifeless lives. Deathless deaths.
“Oh, temporary aggregates, transient compounds bound to disintegrate and disappear, weep not for we are all embodiments of emptiness.
“I am not alive, anymore than you are dead.
“Do your dead ears hear the red robins singing?
“Do mine?”
Sitting in a Graveyard
Too weary to worry about the world,
Too enlightened to take anything seriously,
But holy emptiness,
Temporarily thirsty in a shared desert of form,
Vying with this communion of saints,
I wonder: Who is more empty? Who is more silent? Who is more happy? Me or the dead?
“Life is an unanswered question. But let’s still believe in the dignity and importance of the question.”
More than 100,000 people started out this year thinking they would be living this summer. They’re gone.
But were we ever here?
The Buddha Times 