That Thing Which Really Is Genuine

Think of camouflage

The chameleon who changes his color

Think of the butterfly pretending it has eyes

Think of the flower, saying to the bee, "Like my honey?"

The bee says, "Wow!"

But then that means that the bee has to be

It has to go on living

And all the trouble it takes to go around collecting honey

And raising other bees, and organizing itself

And doing that dance which tells the other bees

Where there's more honey

All that stuff to do

Because the flower was deceptive

Life is a drama, and a drama is a deception

A big act

When you peel an onion

And you don't really understand the nature of an onion

You might look for the pit in the center, like any ordinary fruit has

But the onion doesn't have a center

It's all skins

So when you get right down there's nothing but a bunch of skins

You say, "Well, that was kinda disappointing."

But of course you have to understand

That the skins are the part that you eat

Well, in rather the same way, you see, you find

When you explore yourself and your motivations

You go through and through and you try to find out

That thing which really is genuine

That thing which really is genuine

Well, in rather the same way, you see, you find

When you explore yourself and your motivations

You go through and through and you try to find out

That thing which really is genuine

That thing which really is genuine

That's why, in Zen discipline

They give you kōans which require a perfectly genuine act

An act of total and absolute sincerity

And people knock themselves out trying to do this thing

But they always know that the master's gonna catch them

'Cause he reads their thought

You know that story of von Kleist

About the man who had a fight with a bear?

And the bear could read his thoughts?

So that the only way of hitting the bear was to do so not on purpose

Because the bear would know in advance

So it's the same in working with a Zen master

You have to do the genuine act not on purpose

But since you're put in a situation where it's rather formal

And you're supposed to do it on purpose

You're stuck you see?

So, you explore the onion and you go in, and in, and in

And then you find

Well, it's all a deception

Well, in rather the same way, you see, you find

When you explore yourself and your motivations

You go through and through and you try to find out

That thing which really is genuine

That thing which really is genuine

Well, in rather the same way, you see, you find

When you explore yourself and your motivations

You go through and through and you try to find out

That thing which really is genuine

That thing which really is genuine