Mother Taught Me to Sit Like a Mountain
By Phan Tan Hai
1
Drizzle glides back through my dreams,
soaking an age of memory;
old tales whisper like poetry,
floating into my sleep.
Mother lulls me with gentle words—
praying the rains will bless the rice,
praying the world will rest in peace,
praying all who wander escape the flames of home.
2
Far rain sweeps across the plains,
carrying longing down a thousand paths.
Mother teaches me my first letters,
teaches me to become river, become mountain.
She says I must learn to love all beings—
three realms, countless distant lives.
How could one count all debts of kindness?
Live each fleeting moment with reverence.
3
Night rain carries the forest’s fragrance,
returning to embrace our little town.
I hear Mother teaching me tenderness—
for a sunbeam, a flower, a blade of grass.
She teaches a gentle mindfulness:
love the chicks, love the mother hen;
watch your step for ants along the road—
remember to walk softly.
4
Late rain brings its chill into the night;
I hear Mother reading me a page,
rainfall threading through the porch,
and I sleep within its quiet tapping.
Mother sings old lullabies—? oi—
praying I grow whole in my learning,
praying I never stray from wholesome paths,
praying each word I speak carries the Dharma.
5
Night rain from past lives has not passed;
Mother teaches me to sit like a mountain,
to hear the breath near and far,
to hear the silence of rivers and streams.
She teaches: no self, no other—
walk through the forest of merit;
with eyes of compassion look everywhere,
empty and still, day and night awake.
6
Night rain saddens all of Sài Gòn,
soaking the years when I first grew up.
Mother sings that being is non-being,
that the First Noble Truth holds ten directions of sorrow.
That I am ocean, I am forest,
that I am cloud, I am sunlight;
that this body rushes on without end,
that the mind is quiet through the three times.
7
The Ganges of past lives—night rain—
flows gently within me;
morning, noon, evening, and now,
this shore, that shore, the waters fall dry.
Mother’s words I write into verse,
letters flying mid-sky like wild geese;
in this realm I live as if dreaming—
walking, standing, lying, sitting in stillness.
---- Lunar New Year 2023 (Year of the Cat)
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