Carpe Diem Namasté the Spiritual Way #2 pilgrimage

!! For this special feature you have three days to respond, instead of five as the regular prompts !!

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

Last week I started with Namasté, the spiritual way, a new feature here at CDHK in which I love to explore the spiritual side of haiku and tanka. As you all know one of the classical rules of haiku is that there has to be in some way a deeper meaning in haiku (and tanka). That deeper meaning is mostly based on Zen Buddhism, but in my opinion it's not necessary to bring that Zen Buddhism into your haiku, it can also be a Hindu meaning, a Christian or Muslim meaning, because I think that haiku has no boundaries towards religions and spiritual beliefs. In my opinion all religions and spiritual beliefs are One ... There are a lot of similarities between religions and spiritual beliefs and in my opinion we are all in a way part of God, Great Spirit, Higher Self or what ever name you give it.
Being part of God, made of "god-stuff" as I explained last week in the first episode of "Namasté", makes us one.

Last month we were on a pilgrimage to Santiago De Compostela, but that wasn't our first pilgrimage here. Back in 2014 we were on a pilgrimage straight through the former USSR with the Trans Siberian Rail Road and we went on a pilgrimage along the 88 temples on Shikoku Island, see also our regular episode of today, and I hope to do another (virtual) pilgrimage later this year.

This episode of "Namasté" is titled pilgrimage and I think that it fits the "Namasté" theme, because we saw what Namasté menas last week.
This week I love to go on an inner pilgrimage, I am not going to explain how our body works, we are not going to visit or intestines ...

Inner Pilgrimage

 The above image I have found on a wonderful website named "Creative Pilgrimage"  and I think that's what we are doing as haiku and tanka poets we are on a creative pilgrimage. We are on our way to our Inner Self, as the inside of a shell. We encounter a scene, a short moment as short as the sound of a pebble thrown into water and that brings us to the final frontier ... the haiku or tanka to create.

Fredrick Franck, a philosopher, writer, painter and renown as "The Renaissance Man" and a fellow Dutchman, has once said:

[...] “That I speak here of art as a Way, gives away that I see the way of the artist as a kind of pilgrimage. When you go on a pilgrimage, you set out from where you happen to be and start walking toward a place of great sanctity in the hope of returning from it renewed, enriched and sanctified. However far you may walk, every pilgrimage is a safari into your own dark interior, an inner journey.” [...]

Franck said "The meaning of life is to see" with that he was the founder of what I love to call "the Inner Pilgrimage". His bestselling book about his ideas is titled "The Zen of Seeing".

To bring this idea back to haiku (and tanka). As I stated, and as the classical rules tell us, there has to be a spiritual meaning in your haiku (or tanka) and our haiku are based on what we see ... that tiny little moment that surprises us catches us and makes us emotional and devote ... the only thing we can do is bowing our head in silent adoration, admiration or how you love to call it.

The challenge for this week's episode of "Namasté" is to look around you with the eyes of Zen and try to catch the beauty of that moment ... 

in the puddle
the fragile beauty of clouds
a broken rose

© Chèvrefeuille

Well ... I hope you did like this episode of "Namasté" and I hope that I have inspired you to create haiku or tanka ... Go with me on an Inner Pilgrimage ... explore the Zen of Seeing.

This episode is NOW OPEN for your submissions and will remain open until February 14th 10.00 PM (CET)