Time and the Riddle: Thirty-One Zen Stories by Howard Fast Read Free Book Online

sun, whereupon they shed their leaves, abandoned their dry stems and trunks, and instead grew stems of green, rich in chlorophyl. When the sun attacked these new receptacles of life, the plants thickened their skin until it resisted the worst the sun could do. When animals found these thick, juicy stems very much to their taste, the plants proceeded to grow long, sharp spines, and when the insects they needed so desperately for cross pollination began to avoid the hot desert, the plants developed flowers of such beauty and color as the world had not seen before. Not at all a bad recommendation for the power and resourcefulness of life, the professor decided, looking with affection at his garden of strange shapes, needle-like spikes and gorgeous blooms; not at all. And looking at them, he felt that his affection was being returned, that these marvelous plants knew his feelings and reciprocated them.
    And then something new caught his eye. His strange new cactus, the result of his crossing Echinomastus macdowellii with Echinopsis longispina , had suddenly flowered with one great, lovely bloom: white petals that yellowed at the tips, with a heart that contained a few brilliant pink pistils in a mass of white stamens so heavily crowned with a yellow pollen that they could barely stand erect. For moments that grew into minutes, he stood there regarding it, with pleasure, love and deep aesthetic appreciation. Then, after sufficient homage, he did a very curious thing, moved by something he found difficult to account for later; he wet his finger, reached out and touched the pollen, and then put it to his lips. As his tongue licked it, the reaction was immediate and wonderful. He experienced what Zen people call satori , or, as others say, enlightenment.
    He knew it, because one always does. He could not explain it or describe it, because one never can. He looked at the world around him with understanding and joy and compassion. It was all right. It would be all right.
    Now the professor had a cat. He had the cat, not out of his choice but out of the cat’s choice. It was a mean cat. It was a plain old gray and white alley cat that in its lifetime had suffered such a succession of indignities and hurts that it could only display hate and suspicion.
    It was a nasty cat, a hate-filled, wretched angry cat. And at this moment, the cat was watching the professor with interest, suspicion, and hunger. The cat had been absent for two days, catting around as cats do, which accounted for the hunger.
    Again, the professor wet his finger and picked up a bit of the yellow pollen, which he rubbed off into the center of his palm. Then he bent down and offered his hand to the cat.
    Slowly, dubiously, watchfully, the cat advanced. The professor was patient; the cat was suspicious. The professor had fed the cat for a full two years, and still the cat was suspicious. But the cat was also hungry, and step by step he approached the professor’s hand. He was at the hand. He sniffed. He looked at the professor, and then he sniffed again. And then he licked the yellow pollen out of the professor’s palm.
    And then he looked at the professor—as once in a while, very rarely, a cat will look at a man. Then he mewed.
    The professor reached down and picked up the cat in his hands and then nestled him in his arms. The cat licked the professor’s face and mewed. After a minute or so, the professor put down the cat and went into the house. The cat followed him. The professor went into the kitchen and opened a can of cat food. Purring with pleasure, the cat ate it.
    â€œWhat on earth are you doing in the kitchen?” his wife called to him.
    â€œFeeding the cat.”
    â€œWhy you don’t get rid of that ugly, wretched cat, I will never know.”
    â€œI’m rather fond of him,” the professor replied.
    Then he went into his study and meditated for a while, sitting cross-legged on a small cushion. He had quite a problem