Musings on Japan

I would like to offer my congratulations to Arianna on the Japan edition of HuffPost and her interview with Abe. This is a great sign that Japan, or at least some in Japan, are opening up again after shutting down for the past two decades.

And her Zen musings!... Japan has always been amazing -- the aesthetic jumble of the modern cities vs. the perfection of the bento box, the gardens, the temples...

Our best poets loved Zen and Japan, muses of the moment like Czeslaw Milosz:

"take from movement the eternal moment as a gleam on the current of a black river"

... or Octavio Paz:

"For a moment, sometimes we see/not with our eyes but with out thoughts
Time resting in a pause
The world half-opens and we glimpse the immaculate kingdom
The pure forms, presences
Unmoving, floating on the hour
A river stopped"

Japan also, deep down, remains a frugal island culture.