Practice and Poetry
Friday, April 30; 7:30 PM

Peter Levitt

We are delighted to welcome Zen Poet and Dharma friend Peter Levitt for an evening of exploration around the theme of Practice and Poetry.  This will include a sale and book-signing of his newest publication, Within Within. This is a rare opportunity to meet directly with an award winning poet whose expression rises up from the heart of practice.

Author of ten books of poetry, Fingerpainting on the Moon: Writing and Creativity as a Path to Freedom, and cotranslator, with Kazuaki Tanahashi, of A Flock of Fools, Ancient Buddhist Tales of Wisdom and Laughter, Peter Levitt has also published fiction, and translations from Spanish, Chinese and Japanese. In 1989 Peter received the prestigious Lannan Foundation Literary Award in Poetry. The poet Robert Creeley has written that Peter Levitt’s writing "sounds the honor of our common dance."  He is the editor of Thich Nhat Hanh’s classic, The Heart of Understanding, and is the Associate Editor of Treasury of the True Dharma Eye – Zen Master Dogen’s Shobo Genzo, edited by Kazuaki Tanahashi, which will be published by Shambhala Publications in the summer of 2010.

Peter was introduced to Zen practice in the late 1960’s, and was lay ordained in the Soto lineage of Suzuki Roshi by Jakusho Kwong Roshi. After immigrating to Canada with his family in 2000, he founded the Salt Spring Zen Circle on Salt Spring Island in British Columbia, where he continues to live and lead the sangha.  In recent years, he and SSZC have allied with Zoketsu Norman Fischer of Everyday Zen.

Open to all,  donations appreciated, reception follows.