Grasses, Trees, and the Great Earth

Just returned from the Grasses, Trees, and the Great Earth Sesshin, and am about to head back outside to sit in my backyard under the pear trees to help ease reentry. Before I do, I would like to share an observation from nature. I wish I had my own photos to share.

Anyway, at the monastery, there is a small flower box with cosmos, zinnias and such on the little porch outside the dorm where I stayed all week. It took until about Day 4 for me to truly see a fist-sized zinnia of so many petal layers, and such amazing and hilarious neon bright pinkness, on a break I walked over to just visit it for a moment.


Zinnia Bumble Bee originally uploaded by zizzybaloobah

In doing so, I watched the various bees, particularly the bumblebees, who are currently fat like little yellow and black zeppelins who can scarcely fly themselves around.

I observed one light onto a smaller zinnia, going around counterclockwise, methodically and thoroughly dipping its proboscis into each and every yellow stigma before heavily hovering off to the next flower. Everyone seemed to be having a very good time.

Later in the evening I wandered into the greenhouse where there are also flowers planted for use on the altars. The bumblebees like to fall asleep on flowers. I have seen this before on cosmos in my own cutting garden.

The one I saw was just resting on a pink daisy-like flower. It was almost sleeping. Its little bee legs were sprawled out and its little bee face was completely planted in the midst of the powdery yellow cushion, and it wasn't busy doing anything. It was just lying there, appearing to be drunk on pollen, or just blissed out from a busy bee day. I lightly brushed up next to a nearby plant, a leaf from which just grazed this little bee's leg, and without removing its face from the pollen platter, it lifted up one of its arms towards the source of the mild disturbance, as if to beg for a snooze alarm.

These creatures, these flowers and bugs and animals... they are just simply themselves, wholeheartedly. These precious little jewels everywhere. Can a human life ever be this forthright?