no lies

I’ve never been much of a fan of The Rolling Stones, but I have always loved their song “Dandelion.” There’s always been something there to hold me a while.

As is so often the way, the thought of that song earlier this morning encouraged visions of dandelion-covered lawns to stroll into my mind. Childhood stuff. Every so often some woman I’d never seen in the neighborhood wandering from lawn to lawn, a bucket or basket and small trowel in her hand, digging up and collecting those yellow flora ornaments to bring home for a dandelion soup. I’m 74 and I’ve never tasted dandelion soup. I’ve also never been to Paris. Or New Orleans. Or been married three times. At least so far.

Dandelions don’t seem to be such a big thing out here by the Pacific in Southern California. There’s lots of other yellow flowers, many stunningly yellow, and when a Zen teacher assigned me this Koan a year ago – “Stop the sound of the distant temple bell” – all I could come up with as a very distant cousin to an “opening”, was that I’d been stopped cold – motionless – by a bush of yellow flowers just off the sidewalk on Brighton Avenue in Ocean Beach. Walking away from time in the ocean with my boogie board. Yellow flowers, it seems, always with a way to share, with me, their wonder.

When I was a kid it was dandelions. And a shout out to forsythia. Even a couple of songs from The Rolling Stones.

“Dandelion don’t tell no lies.”