The Dharma, A Poem and all Sentient Beings

Last week, at our meeting, we discussed the definition of "Sentient Beings". This varies from tradition to

tradition but, particularly in Tibetan Buddhism and Japanese Buddhism, all beings (including plant life and even inanimate objects or entities considered "spiritual" or "metaphysical" by conventional Western thought) are or may be considered sentient beings.

Following on from that I came across this poem by John Clare that makes the point nicely.

All nature has a feeling

All nature has a feeling: woods, fields, brooks

Are life eternal: and in silence they

Speak happiness beyond the reach of books;

There's nothing mortal in them; their decay

Is the green life of change; to pass away

And come again in blooms revivified.

Its birth was heaven, eternal it its stay,

And with the sun and moon shall still abide

Beneath their day and night and heaven wide.

John Clare