Here is a poem in the Tanka style by one of my favourite Japanese poets: Saigyo.
A single pine tree
grows in the hollow –
and I thought
I was the only one
without a friend.
The name Saigyo means “westward journey” and in the symbolism of Buddhism westward journey means a journey towards Sukhavati, the Pureland of Amitabha.
Saigyo was a Buddhist monk who wandered and spent much of his time in the mountains. Often, he was in solitude and many times he writes about loneliness.
There are different kinds of loneliness. On the one hand, there is the kind of loneliness, that longs for company – any company, just somebody to talk to, somebody to share experience with, to share a joke or even other meaningless chat about this and that. There can be a comfort sometimes in such common closeness. Talking to a complete stranger brings some affirmation of common humanity.
Here is another poem by Saigyo:
If only there were
someone else willing
to share this loneliness.
Side by side we’d build our huts
for winter in a mountain village.
But then there is also the loneliness that’s a longing for somebody specific. Thus, in another poem Saigyo writes:
As rays of moonlight
stream through a sudden gap
in the storm clouds –
if only we could meet
even for so brief a moment.
Here Saigyo is missing one particular person. On a stormy night, occasionally and briefly, moonlight may break through gloriously, and then just as suddenly be gone again, as the bustling, turbulent clouds hide the moon from view. Missing his friend, he longs for a meeting, even just for such a moment.
Loneliness of this kind is very akin to grief. Many elderly people suffer awful loneliness, as those who have been their companions in life die off or become unable to visit.
When my mother was eighty, I tried, for her birthday, to assemble some of her old friends from earlier in her life. This involved me surreptitiously spying on her old address book and making many phone calls. But I was only able to find one person who was still alive and still able and willing to travel. But there was at least one! So, when the birthday came, I was able to say: “Mother, I’ve got a surprise for you. Just stand here for a moment.” And I went and opened the door and invited in her old friend. There was a wonderfully joyous reunion.
I myself do not suffer much from the first kind of loneliness. From a young age I was an introvert, shy of gatherings. Yet I do miss individuals. As soon as one becomes close to somebody, one risks this nagging ache of separation, that pains the chest and chokes the throat. Being separated from those we love is one of the eight great afflictions.
Like Saigyo, I try to take it as a pathway, savouring the bitter-sweetness of life, that inevitably involves such separations. Here in samsara we are separated from our Pureland home; and a certain kind of loneliness is as much a part of life as the salt taste is of the ocean. Savouring this dukkha, we find our way along the westward journey.
Thank you very much
Namo Amida Bu
Dharmavidya
David
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