Sublime

Basho wrote his haiku in the simplest type of Japanese speech, naturally avoiding literary and “highbrow” language, so creating a style which made it possible for ordinary people to be poets. Bankei, his contemporary, did just the same thing for Zen,

Dharani of the Great Compassionate One all the way down New York’s Second Avenue in a Volkswagen bus.

In just three lines totaling seventeen syllables (5–7–5), a haiku presents a brief meditation in which the reader or listener is invited to participate, using imagery drawn from intensely careful observation.

Khotanese monk’s name was Shikshananda,

Direct pointing (chih-chih a) is the open demonstration of Zen by nonsymbolic actions or words, which usually appear to the uninitiated as having to do with the most ordinary secular affairs, or to be completely crazy.